Alternate Timeline
by sprucetree
Summary: Second story I've done but my first one failed so i tried again but with the same idea of Cutter not dying. I skip like half the season becuase Cutter doesn't die they don't bring danny quinn onto the team. i don't own any characters except Robert. also i only do chapters on key episodes in the series and there will also be a crossover with Primeval New World
1. Chapter 1

Chapter 1

_**Season 3, episode 3**_

As we were thrown in with Jenny, Sarah and Lester I knew there was going to be trouble.

"What has gotten into Cutter?" Lester asked.

"There are two of them." Connor said

"Two Cutters, sounds like some kind of nightmare." Lester said sarcastically.

"So what happened?" I asked.

"Well Cutter came in acting stranger than normal, then Helen took over the ARC." Jenny said.

"So have we got a plan?" Abby asked.

"Yes. Connor," Sarah said sitting in a chair at a laptop, "We need to play this across the central speaker system."

"We can't do that from in here." He said downhearted.

Sarah covered her face with her hands. Just then the door burst open and one of Helens men fell through it. Becker walked in rubbing his fist.

"Want any help?" He said.

"Becker, how many of you are there?" I asked.

"Just me, the others are either dead or at home."

"Shit." I said hitting the wall.

"Becker," Connor said, "We need to get this to the speaker room to play it over the speakers."

"Come with me," he said, "Robert, stay here with Jenny, Sarah, Abby and Lester." He said to me.

"Got it." I said picking up the guards' pistol pulling the slide back.

Becker and Connor ran off down the corridor. The door closed behind them. I leaned up against the wall spinning the pistol around my finger.

"Will you stop that, I really don't want that to go off." Lester shouted.

"Sorry, just trying to pass the time." I said putting the pistol into the waist band of my trousers.

Just then the door opened and another guard came in. He saw his clone on the floor knocked out. He turned to me and threw a punch. I had no time to react. The punch landed on the side of my head knocking me to the floor. My vision went blurry and I thought I was going to pass out. I saw Lester punch the other guard, he picked Lester up and threw him into a locker as though he was a doll. Lester fell to the floor. Abby kicked him in the stomach but the guard was too good for Abby and after a minute she was knocked back into another locker. The guard walked over to Sarah and Jenny and picked them up by the throat. He was choking them. I pushed myself up off the floor. I pulled the pistol out of my trousers and pulled the slide back taking the safety off. I raised the gun up and looked down the sights at the guard.

"Hey!" I shouted getting the guards attention.

He looked over at me and saw the pistol in my hands. I pulled the trigger and put a bullet in his flank. He dropped Jenny and Sarah and tried to pull out his own pistol. I emptied the magazine into the guards' chest. He dropped to the floor with blood leaking from his wounds in his chest.

"Thank you." Jenny spluttered gasping for air.

"No problem." I said rubbing my head and taking the two magazines of the dead guard.

I swapped the empty mag for a full one. I walked over to Abby and picked her up off the floor and supported her for a bit.

"You okay?" I asked her.

"I'm fine, thanks Robert." She said standing up straight.

Just then the speakers buzzed into life.

"Stop, do nothing, obey my voice. Stop, do nothing, obey my voice." The audio file played throughout the whole ARC.

"They did it." Sarah exclaimed.

"Yes all well and good but how do we get out of here?" Lester said standing up.

As he stood up an explosion ripped through the ARC. The stuff on the shelves fell off. After the explosion Becker and Connor opened the door.

"Nice work, now let's leave. Connor, get the girls and Lester outside. Me and Becker will look for Cutter" I said to him giving him the other Pistol with one shot in, "You so much as see Helen, no second thoughts. Shoot to kill, there's one shot in there so aim for the head."

"Got it," he said taking the others in the opposite direction.

"We need to find Cutter now." Becker said.

"Ya think, come on." I said running off holding the pistol down.

We explored the centre of the wreckage knowing that's where the bomb would have gone off. We looked in the room with the dimension model in. underneath a couple of the steel pipes was Cutter.

"He's in here." I shouted taking some of the pipes off him.

"What happened?" Cutter said waking up.

"Explosion, we need to get out of here now." Becker said.

"Ok." Cutter said getting up.

Becker and I supported him and helping him out of the ARC. We got outside and saw the main ARC building with fire licking out of the windows.

"Where's Helen?" he asked.

"She didn't come out. She must still be inside." Connor said.

"I'm going into get her." He said grabbing a torch.

"No," Jenny said, "She wouldn't lift a finger to save you."

"I know." He said.

"I'm not letting you do it Nick," I said, "If you go in there you're signing your own death warrant. I'll go in."

"No she's my wife." He said walking over to the entrance.

"No," I said running after him. "You're not doing it Nick. This team needs you. You're more important than me."

"No, you and Becker need to keep this lot safe."

"You're not going in and that's final." I said punching him in the face.

I took the torch and ran in before he could get up and stop me. I covered my mouth to stop breathing in smoke. I turned the torch on and shone it around. As I walked deeper into the ARC I found Helen lying on the floor buried under concrete from the ceiling. I saw the artefact on the floor in front of her. I picked it up and stuffed it in a pipe beside me. I pulled the concrete off of her legs.

"Nick, is that you?" she asked.

"No, it's not Nick."

"Well someone still came to get me."

"He wanted to come and get you but I didn't let him."

"Ok," she said getting up, "Where's the artefact?"

"It'll be wherever you dropped it when you fell." I said walking back.

"Well what does it do?" she asked.

"I don't know. Only Cutter knows what it does."

"Well in that case. I guess one less person on the research team won't do too much damage."

"What the hell do you mean," I said turning around seeing her pulling a gun out of her waistband, "Oh."

"I'm sorry, but nobody understands the importance of that artefact as much as I do. I've seen the result of the work here. The work that Cutter and you do here results in the creation of the future predators."

"You know what? No wonder Cutter didn't want your help; you just want to do what's best for you. If Cutter knew what happened in the future he would stop it from happening. He wouldn't sanction the order to start experimenting for that."

She gave me a look that would kill. She pulled the trigger twice and the gun fired. One round hit me in the arm and knocked me back and the second shot hit me in the chest knocking me to the ground. I played dead as she walked past. She left the building through the other exit. I got up and rested my shot arm across my chest. I gritted my teeth at the pain. I bent down and took the artefact out of the pipe and put it under my arm. I walked out of the ARC.

I walked out into the crowd and everybody saw my arm. They rushed forward and took the artefact. I leaned up against the front of a car. They all stared at my chest as there was another bullet hole in my chest. I pulled my shirt open and showed them my bullet proof vest.

"What happened?" Abby asked.

"She shot me." I said.

"I knew she couldn't be trusted." Sarah said.

"You're lucky it wasn't you Nick. Now do you understand why I didn't let you go in there for her." I said to Cutter.

"Well, where is she?" he asked.

"She left after she shot me. So that means that she is still out there."

"Dam it!" Cutter shouted.

"Right, well we need to get this looked at and the ARC back up and running. The minister is willing to pay to repair the ARC but he says it's coming out of your pay." Lester said putting his phone back in his pocket.

"Always the funny one," Connor said sarcastically.

"You think I'm joking." Lester said as the medical team came over to inspect my arm and bandage the wound.

"Wait, you mean we're getting paid even less than what we are." Connor asked as if it wasn't clear.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

_**Season 3, episode 9-10**_

"What are we going to do now?" I asked Cutter.

"We're going to follow Helen wherever she goes. Even if that means to the end of time" He said leading us back to the cars.

We drove to the warehouse with the future anomaly in. The guards opened the doors and we drove in. We parked the trucks and got out.

"So what we got?" Connor asked Becker.

"Stun grenades," Becker said, "Future Predators have hyper hearing right. Well these should stop them dead in their tracks."

"Good." Cutter said.

"Sarah, open the anomaly." I said.

She moved to the anomaly locker.

"Oh no. No not now, no!" Connor said.

"What?" Cutter asked.

"Another anomaly's opened. It's Johnsons," Connor said looking at the handheld ADD.

Cutter stopped where he stood.

"It's your call, you decide." I told Cutter.

"Right ok, Becker, you go check it out. Robert, Sarah, you go with him." Cutter said.

"No, I need to go with you. I want to go with you." Sarah said.

"Listen, nobody's saying goodbye, we're coming back," Cutter said, "Now Sarah open the anomaly." Cutter said.

She opened the anomaly, Connor and Abby walked through it.

"Wait," Becker said walking forward, "Take this," he said giving Cutter his shotgun, "Be careful."

Cutter nodded and walked through.

"Close it." I said.

She nodded and closed the anomaly behind Cutter.

"Right, we need to get to Johnsons facility and check out that anomaly." I said.

"Yeah, god I hope they come back." Sarah said.

"Listen they'll be fine. They've got Becker's gun." I said laughing.

Sarah smiled and Becker didn't seem to find it funny.

"Come on." I said walking to the cars.

I got in one while Becker and Sarah got in the other. I turned the engine on and reversed out of the warehouse. I 180d and drove off to Johnsons facility.

We pulled into Johnson's facility and got out of the car.

"Guy's through here." Sarah said.

We followed Sarah down a corridor. After walking for a while we came into the main facility. We looked around and heard what sounded like insect wings. We walked forward for a bit until we heard something thump above us. We looked up and saw one of Johnson's men's mangled body with his arm hanging down.

We all stood back to back. Becker and I raised our weapons and I gave Sarah my handgun. We kept our guard up looking around until we saw a giant bug flying towards us.

Becker pushed Sarah out the way and opened fire on the bug. The insect pushed Becker to the ground and broke his gun. I pulled my rifle into my shoulder and opened fire. Thirty nine millimetre rounds fired into the neck of the bug in under a minute. The bug fell of Becker and he got up.

"Thanks Robert." He said.

"No problem. Not letting you die when you've got the guns."

"Oh thanks." He said.

"Just joking." I said.

"Come on, we need to find the anomaly." Sarah said.

We walked through a set of glass doors onto a small bridge that led across to the other side of the building. As we reached the middle of the bridge two more insects appeared. One was on the bridge and one was flying towards us again. On the bridge there was bags filled with insulation.

"Throw them over the edge." Becker shouted.

We threw one bag each into a pile on the stairs.

"Jump." I said.

We jumped one after another of the edge onto the bags.

"Come on." Becker said running.

We came back out to the car. We looked around and from a separate corridor the other two bugs came out. We dashed for the car. Sarah tried to get in but one of the bugs smashed the driver's window and Sarah got out and closed the door. She looked down the road and the other bug came towards her. She opened the door and the bug smashed into it.

"Come on." Becker shouted taking Sarah with him.

We ran off down the road. We turned left and ran down a pathway with a metal divider in the middle. Sarah and I ran down one side and Becker ran down the other side. He slid under the divider. There was a small metal lift which we ran into.

"There's no way out." Sarah said slamming the side of the lift.

"I'll call the backup team." Becker said

"It's a bit too late for that now." I said.

"Oh my god, they're coming through." Becker said.

I looked around and saw the red box with the power cables for the lighting in.

"Guys I want you to get both of them on the grill at the same time.

"Got it." They said.

I disconnected a couple of the cables and checked if there was electricity. Sparks flew from the end of the cables.

They hit the wire mesh to get the bugs on there.

"Come on, now." Becker said.

I put the end of the cables onto the mesh and the electric current ran through the wire mesh and electrocuted the two bugs.

We walked backwards and slid down the back of the lift.

"Do you think they're the last of things?" Sarah asked.

"Let's go have a look shall we" I said.

We ran through the building until we came to a room with the door hanging off its hinges.

"This is where the anomaly was." Sarah said.

"Dam it, we missed it." I said.

"Well we need to get back to the future anomaly site and open it for them to come through." Becker said.

"Ok." I said walking out the room down to the car.

We pulled back into the warehouse and climbed out the car. I walked over to the anomaly lifting my rifle up.

"Open it." I said.

Sarah pressed a button and the anomaly opened. We stood around waiting for a few minutes for them to come back through.

"Come on Cutter." Becker said getting stressed.

We stood around for a few more seconds. I checked my watch. We were early.

"Give them a few more minutes." I said.

"Ok, two more minutes," Becker said, "Then we're closing it and we're leaving.

Two minutes passed. We turned away from the anomaly and as we walked away we heard a scream. We turned around and saw a predator tearing into one of the guards next to the anomaly. It dragged the guard through the anomaly by his mangled leg. The predator jumped back through growling. The other guard got to close and the predator swiped at him and cut his chest open. Blood poured from the gash in his chest.

"Dam it." I said bringing the rifle into my shoulder.

I opened fire on the predator and small blood clouds sprayed out of where the bullets went into the body of the predator. I wasted a full magazine on the predator but it was still standing. There was one crack that came from behind me. A blood cloud sprayed from the skull of the predator and it fell to the ground in a lifeless heap. I looked behind me and saw Sarah standing with the pistol in her hand aiming at where the predator had been standing a moment ago.

"Nice shot." I said to her putting my hands on my knees.

"Thanks." She said.

"Right come on," Becker said, "We need to get back to the ARC."

"Alright," I said locking the anomaly, "I just feel like we're turning our backs on them."

"Listen, they knew the risks of going through, and they also said that they would be back in two hours. We were there waiting for them but they didn't come back."

"Yeah I know." I said.

"Come on. Well at least we know Helen didn't succeed. We're still here so they must have stopped her." Becker said.

"Was that a joke?" Sarah said.

"No, I don't joke." Becker said,

"Well, I know that's true." I said.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

_**Season 4 prequels**_

I walked into the new ARC. It consisted more of glass and looked more futuristic than the old one did. Its new look suited the role of what we did here more than what the old ARC. I got lost in the corridors until I saw a familiar face.

"Becker," I said running up behind him, "This is new." I said stopping next to him.

"Yeah, suits the ARC more than the old look did."

"What's up?" I asked.

"New candidates for team leader." he said looking at the folder in his hand.

"Let me have a look." I said taking the folder from him.

I flicked through the pages and read down a bit.

"Do you ever think people enjoy boasting?" I asked.

"Got to the bit about Everest." he said.

"Yeah." I said giving the folder back.

"I thought you would have put your name down for selection." Becker said.

"Not that I want to sound perfect," I said, "But to be totally honest I thought since they didn't come back I would have been called up as leader anyway or at least you would have been."

"I was puzzled when you didn't get selected." He said.

We had been walking while talking and had walked into what seemed to be the control room. A girl got up from the ADD and walked over to us.

"Becker," she said, "Have you looked over Matt's folder?" she asked.

"Yes, and I have a better candidate right here." he said putting his hand on my shoulder.

"I don't think we've met." the girl said.

"Neither do I," I said giving Becker a look that would kill, "Robert Jones, I work on the anomalies in the field."

"Jess Parker, I'm the new field coordinator."

"Nice to meet you, now about the role of team leader." I said.

"Well you don't have a personnel folder." she said.

"Yeah about that, I was never really one for leaving my personal information around. I only put a folder in during the time after the final mission with the whole research team."

"Well, it hasn't come through, and not to shoot you down I think this new guy is slightly more qualified than you. No offence." Jess said.

"None taken, but I think being on the anomaly team for something like five years qualifies somebody more than because someone climbed Everest." I said.

"I can vouch for Robert; I've seen him in the field. He started on this team since the first anomaly opened and has been on it ever since until after the incident at parliament."

"I thought the ARC was suspended during that time." Jess said looking concerned.

"Well, let's just say not all of us here settle for doing nothing while there's an anomaly open. Especially if we have access to the field equipment that's needed." I said rocking on the balls of my feet.

"Fair enough, I'll tell Lester that you've put your name down." Jess said.

"No need, I'll tell him myself." I said taking my phone out of my pocket.

I got up Lester's number and dialled. The phone rang and he picked up.

"Yes Robert, unless there's an anomaly I don't think you have a reason to call." He said sarcastically.

"No, it's about the position of team leader. I'm stepping up to the role."

"With no interview or any procedure, seems a bit drastic."

"I'm pretty sure five years of shooting at dinosaurs and things from the future and dealing with anomalies can class as an interview and procedure." I said pointing out to him.

"Alright, I'll clear it with the minister now. Tell that Matt Anderson it was a pleasure to have him put his name forward."

"No, I still want him on the team Lester." I said.

"Alright, call him up and tell him he's on the team."

"Got it." I said hanging up.

"So?" Becker asked.

"Say hello to your new boss." I said putting my phone back.

"You want me to tell Matt he's not on the team?" Jess said.

"No, he's on the team. Just not in charge. Right nice to meet you Jess, Becker, I need to talk to you." I said walking out with Becker following.

"What did you want to talk to me about?" Becker asked.

"Well it's about how the ARC is part privately owned. I want the team to have as little influence as possible with them."

"Got it, I take it we still need to have some influence from the private sector." He said.

"As little as possible, I take orders from Lester and you take orders from me unless I say. The private sector can have input on the team but not control on how it should be run. That's what Lester does."

"Alright, I understand." Becker said.

"Also, the team stays the same. Connor, Abby and Danny aren't dead. We don't close the case on them until there's proof that they're dead."

"Fair enough, are we still going to run rescue missions?" Becker asked knowing my answer would be a no.

"No, I want them to come back but I'm not risking anyone else's life. The investigation remains open but only to anomalies that open. Not to ones that we open ourselves."

"Right, I understand." Becker said.

"Good. Also the team remains the same as when Cutter had control, same risks, same consequences and same precautions."

"That's good enough for me." Becker said.

"Right, I'm going to go home and have a rest. I'll be back in tomorrow. I want to meet this Matt guy. See you tomorrow Becker." I walked off.

I walked into the control room of the ARC the next day and saw Jess sitting at the controls for the ADD talking to a new guy. I heard footsteps behind me and saw Becker coming up behind me.

"Alright," I said to him.

"Yeah, that's Matt by the way; I'll warn you he's not too happy about being turned down for the position of team leader."

"I'll be fine, I'll just run the team like Cutter did."

"Alright, hey just wondering do you still think they're alive?" he asked.

"Of course I do. Abby is probably protecting Connor right now from some sort of future creature and Cutter's probably trying to figure a way back home." I said.

"Thought you would feel like that, thanks for not closing the case for them. I've got a feeling they'll be back."

"Yeah so do I, right time to introduce myself to my competition then." I said walking over.

"Oh hey Robert," Jess said.

"Alright Jess." I said nodding to her.

"Take it you're the boss then." Matt said sounding a tiny bit shocked.

"What, were you expecting someone else?" I asked.

"Just someone, smaller and looks more like a scientist." He said taking in my full size realising that I was bigger than Becker.

"Don't judge a book by its cover." I said to him.

"Fair enough, so what are your qualifications for this then?"

"Five years of risking my neck, five years of shooting at creatures that have killed, five years of tranquilising creatures that don't belong here, five years of going through anomalies and before all this five years of being shot at in the army." I told him waiting for a response that would say I wasn't adequate enough.

"Fair enough, seems good enough." He said wanting to contradict me totally.

"Well, you climbed Everest though so." I said.

"Only just." He said looking like there was something he wasn't telling us.

"Right, Jess, I need you to order in one hundred boxes of 200 tranquiliser darts, three hundred 9mm magazines for the rifles, also I need these parts," I handed her a list, "You think you can get that done." I said to her knowing she could.

"Yeah I'll file the orders for them in a few minutes." She said nodding.

"Thanks Jess." I said walking out of the control room to the menagerie.

I opened the door of the animals' enclosure and stepped inside admiring the size of mammoth that was stood on the far side of the room and then the smaller animals such as the Dracorex. I leaned against the wall and just stood there clearing my head.

I walked out of the room and walked down to the car park. I climbed into my truck and drove out of the car park and back to my apartment.

I climbed out of my bed and saw an orange glow coming through the window, I opened the curtains and saw buildings across the street on fire and anomalies open everywhere. I took a step back from the window just as a shadow fell across the street. The head of something came down in front of my window and it moved forward and a reptilian eye looked in through my window straight at me. I stayed where I was not moving a muscle. The eye moved from the window and I relaxed. As I turned around I heard the window smash and the head of a Tyrannosaur burst through and start trying to get at me.

I ran down the stairs and burst out of the door. As I ran outside I tripped over and looked down and saw the mangled body of Becker laying spread eagle across the ground. I looked around and saw a pack of raptors standing at the end of the road. I ran into my garage and got into my truck. I started the engine and drove out of my garage.

As I got onto the road I drifted to go down the road. I sped off straight for the pack of raptors. As I got closer the raptors looked up and saw me driving towards them. My car smashed through the middle and took out three raptors. As the car hit them their lifeless bodies flew off into different directions. I reached into the glove compartment and pulled out a Desert Eagle hand gun. I put the hand break on, spun the car round and during all of that I put the car into reverse and started going backwards. I smashed the window with the bottom of the gun. I stuck my arm out and squeezed the trigger at the other raptors. I picked off another two with the magazine. I spun the car back around into the correct direction and drove off to the ARC.

I drove into the underground car park of the ARC and stopped my car. I climbed out and saw the other raptor running into the car park. It had chased me all the way from my road to the ARC without me noticing. I put a fresh magazine into my pistol and raised it. I looked down the sights at the raptor and lined the sights up with its head. I pulled the trigger three times. One shot hit the raptor in the neck, the second hit its leg and the final shot found its target. The .50 calibre round hit the raptors head and the power from the shot on the raptors skull shattered the skull and the raptors head exploded.

I turned around and ran up to the control room before any other creatures could hunt me down. As I ran into the control centre I saw Jess's chair spinning around as though something had just leapt off it. I walked forwards with the pistol raised. I checked behind the corners of the worktops and saw nothing. As I got to the ADD I could hear heavy breathing coming from behind it. I looked behind and saw Jess sitting with her knees against her chest. I bent down and looked at her. I could see she had a scratch across her face and her trousers were torn and her ankles were bleeding as though something had tried to chew on them.

"What happened?" I asked.

She looked up at me, "I don't know, all of a sudden there was anomalies opening everywhere and the ADD went berserk, so we scrambled everybody to go out and stop the anomalies from letting any creatures through. But all the teams were too late and creatures had started coming through. Becker went to get you but I lost contact with him just as he got to yours. Where is he? Is he alright?" she asked scared of the answer.

"Becker's dead Jess, a pack of raptors got him. I'm sorry." I said.

She started crying. I put my arm around her trying to get her to stop.

"Well, at least you got here. We're the last ones now."

"Wait, what happened to Lester?" I asked knowing the answer.

"An anomaly opened in the car park just as he was leaving and a predator got him." She said starting to cry again.

"Dam it. Right, Jess I want you to the panic room and stay there until I come and get you, ok." I said to her.

"Ok." She said wiping her tears.

Before she went off to the panic room she kissed me. She pulled away after a few seconds.

"Sorry," she said, "It's just I had feelings about you for the past few days." She said looking down at her feet.

"It's ok, just get to the panic room." I said tilting her head up.

"Ok." She said running off.

I looked around the control room for a bit trying to find any creatures that could have gotten through. I sat down at the ADD and looked at the screens. I could see all the open anomalies and saw about a thousand just in England. It looked as though all the anomalies that have ever and would ever open had opened all at once. It looked as though there were millions over the world. Just as I started tapping on the keyboard I heard a scream come from the corridor. I looked around and sprinted down the corridor running in the directions of the scream. I looked down the corridor and saw Jess pressed against the wall with a predator walking towards her.

"Hey ugly." I shouted, raising the gun and squeezing a shot off. The predator turned its head and if it eyes it was looking straight at me.

I squeezed four more shots off trying to confuse the predator but the predator didn't seem bothered by the shots it just kept walking towards me. As it got a few metres closer I pulled the trigger again and a shot fired. The predator jumped out the way and the shot carried on going and hit Jess in the chest. I looked at her as she slid down the wall a small blood trail following her path down the wall. My arms relaxed against my will at what I had just done. I looked at the predator and saw it getting ready to pounce on me. I tried to raise my arms but they felt as heavy as lead. The predator jumped at me and as it was a few millimetres from my face everything went black.

I woke up sweating and breathing hard. I looked over to the door of my room and saw a predator coming through the door. It looked straight at me and jumped right at me.

I woke up sweating but this time it was for real. I looked at my clock and the time was ten to nine. I jumped out of bed and walked to the shower. I turned the water on and got out of what I'd slept in. I stepped into the shower and felt the warm water flow down my body. I tilted my head back and let the water go through my hair.

After a few minutes I turned the water off and stepped out of the shower. I dried myself off and got some fresh clothes and went through to the kitchen. I got a flask of coffee and went down to my truck. There were scuffs on the front bumper from having to get away from an angry Utahraptor and a new rear bumper after a scrape with a Triceratops. The engine was starting to take longer to turn on after how far I had to push it to get out of the Cretaceous. I pulled out of the garage and sped down the road to the ARC.

As I walked into the control centre there were five boxes sitting at the ADD. I walked over to the boxes and looked at them. There was the clicking of heels on the floor behind me, I turned around and saw Jess coming towards me.

"Oh, hey Robert." She said not realising I was there.

"Hey, Jess. These the boxes I wanted?" I asked.

"Uh, yeah, I was about to call you to say they had arrived. But obviously you already know." She looked puzzled at the happy look on my face.

"Cheers Jess, which had the parts that I ordered in?" I asked.

"The one in the middle." She said sitting down and tapping on the keyboard.

"Cheers." I said picking it up and taking it to my office.

Pinned on the wall in front of the table was the diagram of a rifle with a Taser and a tranquiliser dart barrel. I looked down at the table and there was already the basic components lying on the table like the prototype tranquiliser dart and Taser dart. There were also the inner workings of the rifle like the chamber and firing mechanism, there was also the main body lying next to the smaller parts. I opened the box and saw a CO2 canister lying in the bottom. There was a long metal tube which I would use for the barrel, a rifle scope which would enhance accuracy and also a shot tube but wider which would be used as the barrel for the Taser. I pulled half of the main body over to me and down and pulled the smaller inner workings over and got the small heat pen that I would use to weld the parts together.

About half an hour had passed and I finished welding all the smaller parts together and into the body of the new weapon when there was a knock on the window of the door to my office. I looked around and saw Becker standing there. I opened the door him and he walked in.

"What you doing in here?" he asked

"Just building the prototype for a new weapon we can use in the field." I said pointing to the blueprints.

"We can still take lethal weapons into the field though, right?"

"Yeah, but we use them as the last resort. We use this to try and prevent anything from happening and if it can't be prevented we use deadly force." I said giving him the seal of approval.

"Ok, right I'll leave." He said walking out.

Half an hour later I came out of my office holding the prototype rifle. I came into the control room and saw Becker, Matt and Jess around the ADD. They looked over at me as I came closer. They saw the rifle in my arms and had a look of curiosity in their eyes.

"This," I said, "is our new field weapon."

"What's so special about a rifle?" Matt asked

"It's no ordinary rifle. It has two separate barrels. One to shoot tranquiliser darts to bring down creatures and then if any creatures are getting too close to you there's a Taser barrel which will fire special made electronic head darts that on impact release an electronic charge which will give you enough time to get somewhere safe."

"So you're getting rid of lethal force?" Matt asked.

"No, these are our primary field weapons but deadly force is last resort in any case apart from when a creature kills." I said looking at him waiting for him to argue with me.

"Ok." He said just as the anomaly alarm went off.

"You ready?" I asked Becker as he picked up his black box.

"Ready as always," he said hooking it up, "What 'bout you?"

"Just like old times." I said getting my black box.

Becker, Matt and I ran down into the car park and met the rest of the security team at the trucks. I through the rifle into the passenger seat of my truck and climbed in, turned the ignition on and drove out in front of everybody.

"Jess, where is it?" I asked through my mic.

"About eight miles away, I'm sending the co-ordinates to your black box." She said.

There was a beep and I looked on my GPS screen in my car and the location appeared on screen.

"Got it," I said, "Now send it to everyone else."

"Already done." She said.

"Alright." I said speeding off.

I pulled into a plaza and saw that the rest of the security team were already there. They were standing over two people that were pressed face down on the ground. I climbed out of my truck and walked forward strapping my rifle to my back. As I got closer I realised something.

"You bring me back anything?" I asked squatting down putting my hands out.

The two people looked at each other on the ground and took my hands. I pulled them up.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

_**Season 4**_

"Connor, Abby." I said looking at them.

Abby hugged me and I hugged her back. She pulled away and I and Connor grabbed each other's shoulders and nodded our heads. We looked behind and saw Becker running towards us. He stopped in front of them and pulled them both into a hug. They stood back from each other.

"Where's Cutter?" Becker asked.

"What, he's not with you?" Abby asked.

"No, he didn't come back." I said.

"Well I guess since we're still here he done his job." Connor said.

Another truck pulled up and Matt climbed out. He walked towards us.

"Matt, I'd like to introduce you to two of my closest friends." Becker said.

"Abby Maitland," he said shaking her hand, "And Connor Temple." He shook Connors hand as well.

Connor and Abby looked at each other.

"Right set a perimeter around the anomaly until it closes." I said.

"Robert, you don't need to, I can make it go with this." Connor said holding up the anomaly device.

"Is that what Helen used to open and close the anomalies?" I said.

"Yeah," He said.

"Alright, go ahead." I said.

Connor held the device up and tapped on it. The anomaly flickered a bit but instead of disappearing the anomaly opened again.

"That's not meant to happen." Connor said tapping on the screen of the device again.

Just then a silver shine appeared at the top of the anomaly and floated through.

"That's my blanket." Abby said.

"Your Blanket?" I asked.

But before she could answer there was a loud roar and from the other side of the anomaly came a large Theropod.

"Shit, Spinosaurus. Everybody cover, now." I shouted. I dived behind one of the cars and so did Abby, Connor, Matt and Becker.

"Any information we have on it?" Becker asked.

"Super predator, twenty tones, North America, Cretaceous, god I hate that era. Always has the nastiest creature." I said.

"Right, you've got that rifle," Becker said, "So everyone take a normal rifle." He said getting up and getting his gun from the truck.

"I'm going after it." I said climbing in my truck.

"You sure that's a good idea," Connor said, "That thing is the biggest predator to ever of walked the earth. It could have taken on a Tyrannosaur. So to be totally honest I don't think a truck will stand a chance."

"You're forgetting who you're talking to," I said smugly, "Took on a Giganotosaurus and lived, took on an Utahraptor and lived. I'll be fine Connor." I closed the door of my truck and drove after it.

I drove down through buildings and across on the other road was the Spinosaurus. I looked in my rear view mirror and saw a second truck coming up behind me. At the wheel I saw Becker and in the passenger seat was Matt.

"Jess, I need a large indoor area." I said into my radio.

"There's an arena, I'll download location to your remote." She said tapping on her keyboard.

The directions for the arena popped up on my screen and I headed in the direction for the arena.

"Robert," Becker said through his radio, his voice was covered in static but I could make it out, "We've got the directions for the arena, now go and set up a perimeter around it so we can get the creature in there." He said.

"Got it Becker," I said revving the engine.

"Oh, and Robert, be careful." He said sounding worried about me.

"Understood," I sped off to the arena.

I skidded into the arena and stopped my truck. I climbed out and checked the area. There was a large open area at the base of the stands which looked like it would be used for a stage. There were a couple of side tunnels where we could set up some positions to fire on the creature. I ran up to a platform which had the controls for the lights on. The lights were on and as soon as I got up there I slid all the controls for the lights to off. There was the sound of tire squeal as the doors opened. Becker's truck pulled in followed by the Spinosaurus. I ran down to my truck and pulled by specialist rifle out. I had two magazines for each type of dart. I put the tranquilizer dart magazine in the rifle under the tranquiliser barrel and as the Taser dart magazine was smaller there was a separate loader for that on the side of the rifle. I pulled the safety off and checked the sights. The Spinosaurus ran straight into the middle of the arena and a second truck came in with Connor and Abby in. They jumped out and Connor pulled the anomaly device out.

They hid behind two black boxes and so did the rest of the team. I sprinted over to where Matt and Becker were. I slid in just as the Spinosaurus turned around.

"Close one," Matt said, "Now what are we going to do about the massive dinosaur in front of us."

"Knock it out, open the anomaly and send it back through." I said.

"You're going to…" Becker trailed off as he saw Connor come out from behind the boxes with the anomaly device.

"What is he doing?" Matt asked.

"Trying to get himself killed." I said.

"Does he do that often?" Matt asked.

"Now and then," Becker said.

"And how does it work out?" Matt asked.

"Eh, depending on the situation." I said.

"So, by that you mean never." Matt said.

"Yeah, pretty much." I said.

"Well, we need to get him out the way." Becker said.

We all looked around for something to use to get Connor out of the way. I saw a cable which would have been used to hoist things up and down.

"Matt," I said tapping his shoulder, "You see that cable, I want you to get strapped in the harness on that and then when I give you the signal pick Connor up. Becker you go with him and operate the controls."

"Got it," They said in unison.

"Right now you two go and get ready and let's wait and see if Connor can get an anomaly open to get it through."

"Ok, we'll give him a chance." Matt said.

"Right now go." I told them.

I turned the voltage on the darts up to about one and a half thousand volts, and loaded the dart into the chamber. Connor was still trying to open an anomaly. The Spinosaurus turned and looked straight at Connor. Connor just stood there as the Spinosaurus came towards him. I pulled the rifle into my shoulder and aimed down the sights at the neck of the Spinosaurus. I squeezed the trigger and there was the sound of the dart exiting the barrel with a puff of air. The dart flew towards the Spinosaurus and as it hit the thick skin there was the flash of electricity racing through the body knocking it off its feet.

I signalled to Matt and he came down on the wire to pick Connor up. Connor grabbed hold of Matt but only with one hand as the other was still tapping on the anomaly device. I could see Matt shouting at Connor telling him to hold on with one hand. The Spinosaurus started to get back up.

It got up and looked up and saw Matt and Connor hanging there. I pulled the rifle up to fire another dart but as I pulled the trigger the rifle jammed.

"Fuck it." I shouted just as the wire jammed.

I could see Connor slipping down and Matt shouting at him. Connor was still tapping at the screen but as the wire jolted the anomaly device slipped from his hand just as he got a final tap on the screen. Connor grabbed Matt with both hands just as the anomaly device started beeping. The Spinosaurus jumped up and swallowed the anomaly device. There was a flicker and an anomaly opened inside the stomach of the Theropod. The Spinosaurus imploded and disappeared in the anomaly. Then the anomaly locked itself and disappeared.

I relaxed as Connor and Matt came back to the ground. We all rushed over to them.

"You all right?" I asked them both.

"Yeah, just apart from the fact I almost got eaten." Connor said resting his hands on his knees.

"Alright." Matt said.

"Well, we need to get back to the ARC, so you can all be briefed also you need to get home and get a shower." I said to Connor and Abby.

They laughed as we all walked back to the trucks.

We walked into the control room of the ARC. Connor and Abby had a shocked looked on their face at the new upgrade of the ARC. Connor looked over at the ADD and was surprised at the new look of that. We walked over and took in the new layout and everything that was going on the screens.

"Now that is one serious upgrade." Connor said sounding pleased.

Jess looked over her shoulder at Connor.

"Hello." Connor said.

"Hello," she said getting up from the chair, "I'm Jess, so good to finally meet you guys. Becker's told me everything. You guys are like legends around here."

"Cheers mate." Connor said.

"Whatever, I thought you were dead." He said sarcastically.

"Where's Sarah?" Abby asked just realising she wasn't there.

Me and Becker looked at each other wondering if we should tell them.

"Abby, Connor," Philip said walking up to us, "I can't tell you what a relief it is to see you two. Forgive me…" He said as Connor interrupted.

"Philip Burton, I know. This is the man who invented the room temperature super conductor. He's like a living legend," Connor said shaking hands with Philip, "If all the fantastic four were rolled into one, they'd sort of look like this. Except not a super hero more like a science nerd."

"Thank you for the compliment, I think" Philip said.

"Yeah, it was, I'm just over excited. Why are you here?" Connor asked.

"After the catastrophe of your last mission the government thought the ARC would benefit from private sector management." Lester said.

"Catastrophe?" Abby asked.

"It was a tough time for all of us."

"There was a demand for new thinking, you must understand, more resources. But we can discuss all this later. Right now you need to be debriefed and I want to hear every detail."

"I can't believe I'm going to be working with Philip Burton." Connor said.

There was silence for a few moments before Philip spoke up.

"James lets continue this in your office."

They walked off after Philip and Lester.

"Hang on; I want to speak as well." I said running after them.

I ran up the stairs after them into Lester's office. As I got in the door shut behind me.

Lester went behind the desk and sat down while Philip stood. Connor took the chair in front of the desk and Abby stood against the window while I stood next to the door.

"I'm sorry to have to say this but when the ARC was reorganised the decision was to only select operational staff from a military background. The frontline is just no place for amateurs." Philip said.

"Amateurs, us." Abby said walking away from the window.

"Perhaps it was the wrong word." Philip muttered.

"Don't tell me you agreed to this." Connor said to Lester.

"It was my idea." He said.

"Well can I just make a point here," I said stepping in, "If that was the case then why am I still on the team?" I asked.

"Well, we found your records and found out you had background in the military." Lester said.

"I never submitted…" I said as I remembered, "Oh yeah, I gave you my file." I said feeling so stupid.

"You had background in the army?" Abby asked surprised.

"Urm, yeah I did." I said.

"But you're only like twenty." Connor said.

"Yeah, I went into the army when I was eighteen." I said.

"You never said anything." Abby said.

"You never asked." I pointed out.

"So, back to the point, take some personal time, rest. Use the company apartment," Philip said, "When you come back we'll discuss something away from the firing line."

"You don't get it, all the time we spent away, all the sacrifices we made. It was all for this," Connor said shouting getting up from his chair, "So we could carry on with the work we started, so we could fight until we actually won! We can't quit now! Not after everything we've been through!"

"It's for your own good Connor." Lester said

"Hang on. I want a say in this, I didn't agree to my field team being military based." I said.

"No, you don't get a say in this." Philip said.

"I'm sorry but I really couldn't care less about the private sector now. Lester I want them on my team!" I said forcefully.

"They're not going on the field team." Philip said.

"Just shut the fuck up!" I shouted, "Lester, I've worked on this team for five years and I've worked with civilians or amateurs, whatever you want to call them," I said glaring at Philip, "Now, I want Connor and Abby on my team, nobody knows the anomalies better than Connor does and nobody knows animals better than Abby."

"Listen, Robert, it's not because they don't have a military background, "Lester said, "It's cause we don't want anyone else risking their lives that don't need to."

"Tough shit Lester. They're on the team or I resign and you have to find someone to replace me!" I said shouting.

"Fine. They can be on the team." Lester said giving in.

Connor and Abby looked at each other smiling.

"Thanks Lester." Abby said.

"Right now if that's everything me and Lester need to have a little chat." Philip said.

Me, Connor and Abby walked out of Lester's office and to the rest of the team.

"So, what's happened?" Becker asked.

"I persuaded Lester to let them stay on the team." I said.

"Nice work," Matt said, "But right now I have to leave." He said walking off."

"What'd you do?" Jess asked.

"Told Lester that either they continue on the team or I resign and he has to look for someone else to run the team." I told them.

"Fair enough." Becker said.

"So now, as far as I'm concerned, this is the end of the day. So I'm going home, and you two," I said pointing at Connor and Abby, "You two need to go home and one, get a shower and two get some rest."

"Ok." Connor said smirking.

"Thanks Robert. It means a lot that you'd resign if we weren't on the team." Abby said.

"No problem I wouldn't want two of the best people on this team not to be out in the field with me." I said putting my arms around Connor and Abby.

"Really, that's what you think of us." Connor said.

"Of course."

"What do you want?" Abby asked sarcastically.

"Well if that's what you think. I'll have a new car and fifty quid." I said laughing.

We all walked out laughing.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

The anomaly alarm blared throughout the ARC. Connor, Abby, Becker and I ran to the ADD. Just as we got there Jess sat down.

"What we got?" I asked.

"It's a theatre on Cooper Street." Jess said tapping on the keyboard.

"Abby," Becker said chucking her black box and car keys to her, "Connor," he chucked Connors black box to him, "Let's go." He said running off.

I got my black box and ran off up the stairs. Connor ran after us checking the ADD.

"Connor," Philip said standing at the railings, "I need your help."

"Ah, it's an alert I should." He said gesturing to the rest of us.

"This is more important. I need you to run the new security protocol. Check for glitches."

"Really, could it not wait, I should." He said gesturing to us again.

"The core team have military training. You have other skills." Philip said.

Connor looked at me and I nodded that it would be fine. I ran off down to the car park, unlocked my truck, climbed in and drove off up the ramp.

We got to the theatre and pulled into the car park. We climbed out the cars and pulled out the new rifle which had been produced for the team over the past two weeks. We turned the torches on and entered the theatre. We walked through checking our corners.

"Sweep the theatre for any sign of incursion. Abby, Becker and I will lock the anomaly." I said as we got to the main stage.

The rest of the team went off to check the rest of the theatre as us three climbed up onto the stage.

"Matts signal is coming from backstage." Abby said walking off behind the stage.

We walked into the area where the props were kept. We walked forward and checked for any sign of a creature. As we turned a corner we saw a shining flickering light bouncing off the wall beside us. We turned to the other side and saw the anomaly flickering. No matter how many of them I saw I was always amazed at how wonderful they were. The way the anomalies flickered and looked like hundreds of broken bits of a mirror and acted like a mirror made them look like a marvel of nature. Becker took his backpack off and took out the smaller version of the anomaly locker.

"We're backstage Jess, we've located the anomaly." Abby said into her radio.

"Matt should be right behind you." Jess said, her voice coming through our radios.

"Go find him." Becker said.

Abby and I turned around and split up to look for Matt. I heard the anomaly lock behind me.

"Guys, over her," Abby said.

I ran over to where she was and so did Becker. I saw Abby knelling over the body of a woman. Becker and I squatted down next to her.

"She's dead." Abby said.

We all looked around to see if there was a creature.

We all split up and agreed to meet back at the anomaly. We all looked for Matt or a creature. Five minutes passed and we met back at the anomaly.

"No sign of Matt or a creature." Becker said.

"Then where is he. Jess anything?" I asked.

"I've checked the CCTV and he hasn't left the theatre, at least through the door." Jess said.

"He would never go through; he knows the rules, no expeditions, no search parties, and no rescues." Becker said.

"Yeah but sometimes rules have to be broken." I muttered.

"Besides," he said without hearing me, "If he's been dragged through by a creature he's already dead."

"Come on mate, you know it's the right thing to do." Connor said through the main radio on the ADD.

"No, we keep searching the theatre." Becker said turning around.

"Becker!" I said forcefully.

"No Robert, either you stay here or search the theatre with me. Either way this stays locked." He said pointing to the anomaly.

After I gave no answer he turned away and walked off with Abby following.

"Becker, listen its Connor," he said into the radio, "You need to open the anomaly now. This is Matt, we're talking about."

"You know the rules better than anyone. If he's gone through it's on his own head." Becker said.

I stood there getting angrier every second.

"You don't know what it's like to be trapped…" Abby said trailing off.

"Becker, it's my call," I said pressing the unlock button, "I'm opening the anomaly and you can't tell me otherwise." I shouted.

The anomaly flickered and opened. I stood there waiting a few seconds pulling my rifle into my shoulder. A minute passed before Matt came back through carrying someone else. I walked back a few paces just as a creature came through. In the blink of an eye I loaded a Taser dart on its lowest setting and fired two darts. They both hit the torso of the creature pushing it back a couple of steps until I fired the third which hit it again and pushed it through the anomaly. I jumped forward and locked the anomaly again, just as Becker and Abby ran in.

"Before you ask she just ran through." Matt said to me.

"You followed her." Becker said to Matt.

"Yeah," He said.

"And you," Becker said to me, "You disobeyed my orders."

"You don't give the orders around here, remember that Becker. If you don't want me to be team leader you shouldn't of put my name forward."

"I'm the head of security and it's my job to keep you safe! No matter what the situation!" he shouted at me.

"And I'm team leader, I call the shots and I was the bodyguard of the team before you came along!" I shouted back at him making him shut up.

"What was that thing?" Abby asked.

"By the looks of thing a type of raptor taking in that sickle claw, more humanoid than a Velociraptor so I'd say one that is more adapted to climbing, and with that tail I'd say a tree climber." I said looking at Matt waiting for confirmation.

"Bang on. So you don't want that thing coming back through." He said looking at me.

"We found a woman," Abby said with Matt looking at her, "Dead, not a creature attack.

"We need to get her to hospital," Becker said to Matt picking up the other woman, "Come on."

An hour had passed since Matt and Becker had taken the woman to the hospital and gotten her a bed. I and Abby had taken the dead woman to a lab to get her analysed and find out what had killed her. As the doctor came up to me and Abby with a sheet of paper, she handed us the sheet and I looked at it. I handed it to Abby and the look on her face was shocked.

"What's wrong?" Becker asked walking into the lab.

"This is what's wrong," Abby said handing him the sheet, "You see?"

"Seriously, are you kidding me?" Becker said.

"Matt you need to get down to the lab right now." I said into my radio.

"Ok, I'll meet you down there in a minute." He said.

He took a couple of minutes to find the lab but when he came in he saw us looking at the sheet of paper we had.

"What's up?" he asked.

"The woman we found dead in the theatre, she died of an infection that antibiotics would have knocked back in days." Abby said.

"Also, she's showing signs of antibodies for smallpox. How's that possible?" Becker said.

"When I followed her friend through she knew that world, she knew how to deal with those creatures," he said with his arms crossed, "Look I don't think either of them are from our time." Matt said.

We all walked up to the ward that the woman Matt had followed through the anomaly was on.

"I'm taking her into protective custody." Becker said.

"You're what?" Matt asked surprised.

"I see where Becker's coming from," I said, "As you said, she's clearly not from our time."

"Exactly, she could be infectious, hostile, and or psychotic. We take her in and let the experts deal with it." Becker said.

"No," Matt said getting angry, "We're the experts, and she's a human being not a creature."

"I didn't bring her here, so whatever happens to her is not my responsibility." Becker said.

"Listen you two stop fighting. At the end of the day it's my call on what happens." I said interrupting them arguing.

"So, on my judgement we have to treat this with some sensitivity. Matt said.

"In your judgement," Becker said hoarsely.

"Why don't you just say it?" Matt said angering Becker even more.

"Fine, you chasing her through the anomaly put everyone at risk. Too many people die that way." Becker said walking off.

Jess spoke up through the radio. "We have an incursion at the theatre, one man down."

"Great, one man down, nice work." Becker said bumping into Matt on his way out.

"You stay here; I'll get him to calm down." I told Matt running off after Becker.

We got to the trucks and before Becker could get in and I grabbed his shoulder.

"Calm down before you do anything stupid." I told him.

"No, we have a man down because Matt had to follow her through and break regulation. This team has lost too many members due to stupid mistakes of going through anomalies."

"Yeah and we all know the risks of going through. We've gone through anomalies before, some of us more than others. But if we have to go through then we have to. Cutter knew what would happen if he didn't get back. Everyone on this team knows what can happen. So that's why I'm the only one on this team that can go through an anomaly," Becker looked like he was going to argue, "And don't try to argue with me. I worked with Stephen before the anomalies, I know how to deal with creatures and keep myself safe. So if an incident comes up where I need to go through I'll take a lethal rifle it makes you happy."

"Fine but if anyone dies on this team because of that choice just remember you made that choice." He said climbing into his truck.

He turned the engine on and drove off leaving me standing there. I walked over to my truck just as Abby got down.

"Where'd he go?" she asked.

"He's pissed off, he'll calm down." I said climbing into the driver's side of my truck.

Abby climbed into the passenger seat, "What'd you say to him?"

"I just told him that if we have to go through I'm going through and no one else is." I said to her putting the truck into gear and driving off.

"Seems enough to piss him off then," Abby said.

After about ten minutes we pulled up to the theatre and saw Becker running down a side alley. We climbed out of the car grabbed our rifles and ran after him. We caught up with him just as he met up with another team member.

"I've lost all radio contact with the ARC." Becker said sounding worried.

"Jess, you there, come in Jess," there was no answer from Jess, "Matt, can you hear me, Matt come in." still no answer.

"Matt as well." I said looking at Becker.

"Well what are we talking about?" Becker asked the other member of the security team.

"Some sort of two legged lizard."

"Same as what came after Matt." I said.

"Tree raptor," Abby said.

We all ran down the alley and walked in through a door at the end. We walked back through to the main stage. Becker took one side of the seats. Abby took the stage and the centre of the theatre and I took the other side of the theatre. We all met up and took the higher seats. We walked around until Becker climbed over a barrier.

"Guys, he's over here." Becker said holding his hand up with blood on his fingers.

There was a hissing noise from a door behind him.

"Don't move." I said to Becker pulling the rifle into my shoulder.

A tree raptor appeared round the door and was getting ready to pounce.

"On the count of three dive." I said.

Becker nodded. There was then a bark coming from the stairwell. The tree raptor that was about to attack looked up the stairwell and ran back up. I lowered my rifle and Becker got up.

He looked around and checked the stairwell. I vaulted the barrier and so did Abby. Becker walked up the stairwell.

There was the sound of footsteps on the main floor and Matt ran in.

"Robert, Abby." He shouted up.

"There's two of them." Abby hissed.

"I know, I think ones gone outside. I'll take that one you and Becker search in here." He said.

We nodded and carried searching the theatre. There were footsteps as Becker came back down the stairwell.

"Nothing up there." He said lowering the rifle.

We searched the ground floor and Abby took the stage. She walked in and started to look around. Becker started making his way towards her and so did I. Just as we got to the stage Abby ran off deeper into the theatre. I followed her through and followed her up the metal stairwell behind the stage. She was one flight of stairs ahead of us when we heard a clatter on the floor.

I jumped up the last three steps and raised my rifle and saw Abby on the floor.

"What happened?" I asked.

"The tree crawler tripped me." She said getting up.

"Where'd it go?"

"Went up somewhere." She said running off.

I followed her round until we came to the ropes for the metal beams. She untied one rope and a metal bar came down. There was no sign of the raptor on that one. She then moved to another rope and pulled it so another beam came down. Near the end of the beam was the tree raptor. As it looked around and saw us it started to run with perfect balance across the beam. Abby ran back to me and I raised my rifle. As it jumped I fired a low volt Taser dart. The dart hit the lizard and an electric current coursed through its body knocking it down from its course. It fell down to the stage. We looked over and saw Becker standing over it with a tranquilizer dart sticking out of the neck of the lizard.

He looked up and saw us. He nodded at us to confirm it was down. I and Abby breathed a sigh of relief. We carted the tranquilized raptor back to the anomaly and put another dart in it just to be sure. We opened the anomaly and put the other creature through. After we hauled the creature through the anomaly we locked the anomaly again.

We ran out to the trucks and got in them. We drove off towards Matt's location.

"We're on our way Matt." I said into my radio.

"I've ran out of shots on my rifle get here fast." His voice came back covered by static.

"Matt we're at your location," I said five minutes later. "We're coming up." We said climbing out of the trucks and getting our rifles.

As we were about to go up we heard a thud on the ground about ten metres away. We ran over and saw the second lizards squashed body pressed onto the pavement. We looked up and saw Matt standing at the edge of the building. He raised his hand at us.

Abby ran ahead of Becker and me into the building. I and Becker walked slowly across to the door.

"Listen, Becker, I'm sorry about earlier. Just ever since we closed the anomaly on Cutter, Abby and Connor I never like to leave any team member on the other side of and anomaly, 'cause it feels like we're turning our backs on them." I said to Becker.

"It's alright, I know you done it so Matt could get back through so I won't hold you against what you done. I know you; you're a good man Robert You make the right calls so that's why I put you forward. It's just that ever since Sarah died I just don't like leaving anomalies open in case that happens again."

We walked into the building and saw Abby and Matt standing there.

"Matt." Becker said.

"Hey."

"Right, Becker, Abby and I will make sure the clean-up happens. I want you to go back to the ARC," I said to Matt.

"I'm going to look for the mystery woman." Matt said.

"Alright, you do that." I had a feeling he wasn't telling us something.

Becker, Abby and I walked off to get the area around the creature cordoned off so the clean-up team could get it out of here.


	6. Sorry

Right I know this isn't a chapter so sorry to all of those who are reading this story but I feel like there's no point in doing these parts if you've watched the series. so to all of you that have watched it from the last chapter all the way through to the last episode in series 5 happen the same way but just with Robert as team leader. So now I'm going into the part where I do my own series 6 and cross the two teams over (The original ARC and the Vancouver team)


	7. Chapter 6

Start of Season 6, Chapter 6

The New Year's party at the ARC didn't exactly go to plan. We were all standing in the central control room. Connor and Abby were in each other's arms. Two months ago they had gotten married. Matt and Emily were standing together, Becker was standing alone and so was Lester. Then there was me and Jess, we were standing holding each other's hands. The clock on the ADD hit ten seconds to midnight.

"Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five…" we all started the countdown to the new year but we were interrupted by the ADD switching from the clock to the alarm system.

"Oh joy." I said walking towards the ADD with Jess.

"Well, that ruined the atmosphere." Lester said.

Jess sat down at the ADD and started tapping on the keyboard.

"Where is it?" Matt asked taking his black box.

"I can't tell. There's too much interference coming from all the power lines." she said tapping the keyboard trying to isolate the location.

"Well, where's the location you're trying to localise?" Connor asked.

"It's in Piccadilly Circus for sure, but the location is about a ten mile radius." Jess said tapping away.

"Right, that's good enough," I said, "Connor, Abby take a truck and search around. Matt, Emily you do the same and so will Becker and I. If we find any sign of an anomaly or incursion we radio the others, understood?" I asked them.

"Got it." they all said turning their black boxes on.

"Right you lot go ahead, I've got some loose ends I need to tie up." I said walking off to my office.

I opened the door and walked in. Lying on the table was the refreshed and updated version of the anomaly device that Helen had used over a year ago. I picked it up, turned it on and tapped on the screen. The device flickered into life and up popped the location of the anomaly within a hundred metres.

I ran back to the central hub and walked over to Jess. I reached into the pocket on my jacket and pulled out a set of keys. I dangled them in front of Jess. She looked up at me with a puzzled look on her face.

"They're the keys to my apartment. I want you to go to my place and then in the cupboard just as you walk in is the layout for a new system. I've already tested it over my laptop and it runs with Connors original system. It fits over it perfectly and is just a refined version of his system but without the glitches."

"And what would those glitches be?" Jess asked a smile forming on her face.

"Well, it filters out all the outside interference from power lines so it will always pick up the location of an anomaly. You read the file on the artefact that we had here and were trying to work out?" I asked knowing the answer.

"What do think?" she said.

"Thought so, well because it was a dimension model like what went into the devices that Helen used to open anomalies I had some spare time on my hands and one of the devices so I exported all the files off the device onto my computer and filtered them all onto a system that could run with this."

"So what does that mean?" Jess asked.

"It means that if we sync it properly we should have all the information of where the anomalies will open and when they will open."

"So you mean we'll have a head start on the anomalies."

"Correct." I told her.

"Alright," she took the keys from my hand. "Be careful Robert." She said kissing me on the cheek.

"I will, I'll come back in one piece." I said kissing her back.

I ran out of the central hub and down to the car park. Becker was standing by the car.

"What took you so long?" he asked.

"I had to grab something from my office and then I had to give Jess something." I told him climbing into my car.

"What'd you get?"

"Well, you remember the device that Helen used?"

"Yeah,"

"Well, I modified it and made it into a new casing with a new power source. Also it doesn't just open anomalies but it shows the location of any anomalies that are open." I told him.

"So you mean you have the location?" he asked.

"Well I've got the location within a hundred metres, so closer than what the ADD could give us."

"Fair enough, so you ready?"

"I'm always ready." I said driving out of the car park.

We drove into Piccadilly Circus and I checked the anomaly device and turned down a side street. We carried on driving for a couple hundred metres until we saw a flickering light bouncing off the walls of a small alley.

Becker and I climbed out of the car and pulled out our weapons. He took the safety off his rifle and checked the sights. I put the two magazines into my handgun and pulled the slide back. Becker and I ran off to the alley. We walked into the alley and saw the anomaly flickering in the centre.

"Robert, we have a creature incursion," Matt said through the radio, "We have an Albertosaurus on the run." I heard the roar from the carnivore through the radio.

"Alright, we've found the anomaly, check my location and then get here and if you can bring the Albertosaurus with you." I told him.

"Robert," Connor said, "Abby's been called back to the ARC."

"What for?" I asked concerned.

"Umm Jess passed out." Connor said.

"What?" I shouted.

"She was sitting at the ADD and she just collapsed." Connor said.

"Emily's gone back as well." Matt said.

"Alright, I want this wrapped up as fast as we can so that we can get back." I said my voice wavering with worry.

Becker and I heard a raw come from down the street. We looked around and saw Matt driving down with the Albertosaurus chasing him. Becker and I knelt at the side of the anomaly setting up a barrier. As the Albertosaurus came closer my vision started to go blurry. I started to feel dizzy and when the Albertosaurus was about ten metres away I stood up with my hand on my head not realizing how close the Albertosaurus was. I stood in front of the anomaly and just as the Albertosaurus got to the anomaly it bowed its head and caught me in the chest. It lifted its head and threw me through the anomaly. I hit the ground and my vision started to go black. I saw the Albertosaurus run over me. I rolled over onto my side and held the pistol up. Before my vision went completely I squeezed off a tranquilizer shot and the dart flew towards the Albertosaurus. The Albertosaurus ran through another anomaly and the dart flew through as well so I had no idea if I had hit my target. I rolled back over and my vision went completely as I blacked out.

I woke up and tried standing up. As I got to my feet I felt dizzy and fell down again. I stood up again slowly. This time I didn't fall down. As I put all my weight through my legs I felt a sharp pain in my right leg shoot up from my ankle. I tried walking a few steps and the pain didn't subside. I realised that when I landed I must have sprained, or worse, broken my ankle. I looked around and saw hundreds of anomalies. I tried to figure out which was the one I had come through. I walked through an anomaly and came out into a warehouse. There was two military personal standing at the anomaly. They saw me come through and ran over to me.

"Put your hands in the air sir." They shouted at me.

I put my hands in the air and they pulled my pistol out of my hand and hand cuffed me. They had made one crucial mistake when they cuffed me; they had cuffed me at the front. The walked me out of the warehouse into what looked like a military base. They walked me over to a man in a military uniform.

"Colonel Hall," one of the soldiers said saluting, "This man came through the gateway carrying this." He said handing the Colonel my pistol.

"Listen, I really need to get back, so if you can just un cuff me and give me back my weapon I'll be on my way." I said to the Colonel.

"Not just yet I think." Hall said.

"You don't understand how important it is I get back" I told him.

"No you're right I don't understand how important it is you get back, but also you don't know how important it is you tell me everything about those gateways."

"Well if I did that I'd have to kill you." I said.

"That's the most original line I've heard." The colonel said with sarcasm in every octave of his voice.

"Yeah, the thing is I'm serious. I'd be breaking the official secrets act and since I'm taking a guess I'm in Canada you don't have that do you." I said.

"Oh and tell me exactly where you're from then." Hall said.

"London, England." I told him.

"And how did you come by these gateways?"

"Right, well first of all they're called anomalies, and I already I can't tell you that information."

"Well maybe that will help when I check out your background."

"Right minor question, what's the date?" I asked putting my weight on my healthy leg.

"June ninth, two thousand and twelve." Hall said.

"Ah, yeah, that wasn't the date when I came through."

"So what exactly was the date when you came through?"

"January first, two thousand and thirteen." I said just as the colonel's phone rang.

"Colonel Hall," he said answering his phone, "Alright, I'll run the rescue mission, give me about ten minutes to get them back." He hung up.

"Rescue mission?" I asked.

"Need to know basis, and a civilian like you doesn't need to know." He said walking off.

"Fuck sake, don't you understand, I don't belong here, I need to get back to my time." I shouted.

"We can settle this later, meanwhile you need medical help with that ankle." He said this time walking off to more military personnel.

"Great, absolutely great," I said to myself, "Stuck in a time that I don't belong in, with no means of contacting home, oh and above all things, its New Year 's Day. What a way to spend a nice day with Jess." I said punching my hand.

Two medics came over to me and took me to the medical camp. They sat me down on a camp bed and checked my ankle.

"My ankle is fine, it's just sprained. I don't need medical attention." I said trying to get back up.

They sat me back down on the camp bed and got a splint out. They strapped it to my ankle and tightened it up.

"Right thank you even though I didn't need that. Now can I please get these cuffs off." I shouted.

The soldier that had cuffed me when I came through came over to me with keys and undone the handcuffs. I rubbed my wrists to get the circulation flowing back to my hands. I walked around the base for a couple of minutes taking in that it looked like it had been set up for an invasion or something. I heard a truck backing up when I saw a team of soldiers come from the warehouse. Among them was two people I didn't recognise and then I saw Connor and to my horror Becker was being carried between two of the soldiers one of his arms covered in blood.

I walked back to the medical camp and met Connor and Becker there. The two soldiers laid Becker on one of the camp beds and the medics immediately swarmed around him. Connor looked up and saw me.

"What the hell happened?" I asked as he walked over to me.

"That Albertosaurus, we came through after you and then we met up with Dylan, went through one anomaly to go help Evan. We got him out, then when we came back through Becker got chased through another one and then we had to go get him. The anomaly that we went through led to Evans past in what he now owns. When we found Becker he was like that and explained that the Albertosaurus attacked him but he got away. Then when we came through that one, the Albertosaurus chased us. Then Colonel Hall came through with a rescue team, tranquilized the Albertosaurus and brought us back here." Connor explained.

"Great, let me guess you tried explaining that you didn't belong here and you need to get back?"

"Yeah, pretty much."

"And he didn't listen."

"Yeah,"

"Thought so, now totally away from subject, is Jess alright?" I asked.

"As far as we know, the ARC radioed us before we decided to come after you to say she was alright and that she had just been doing too much which had caused her to pass out."

"That's fine, so at least she's alright. Now let's get Becker back on his feet and get home so we can have that party." I said trying to sound up beat.

"All right, let's get this wrapped up and see if we can get our anomaly locked." Connor said walking back to Becker.

We stood around Becker watching the medics work on his arm. After about five minutes the medics finished bandaging Becker's arm and had cleaned all the blood.

"He'll need about half an hour to recover; he lost a lot of blood from that wound. It may not have been deep but it cut through a lot of veins and arteries." A medic said to us.

"Alright, thanks for your help." I said turning away.

"Excuse me." Another voice said coming up behind Connor and I.

"Yeah." I said turning around.

"Can I talk to you for a minute, about the Anomaly Research Centre?"

Connor and I looked at each other wondering what he could have to say about the ARC.

"Yeah sure," Connor said walking behind a truck.

"Do you remember me?"

"No, should we?" I said.

"I used to work with you, but you don't remember" the man said.

"And you look like you don't remember either." Connor said.

"That's my problem, I don't. There's another me, he's dead now. Wore a jacket just like those." He said pointing at our jackets.

"Then you got a glimpse of something you shouldn't have." Connor said turning away.

"Look," he said stopping Connor and turning him around, "Six years ago Evan changed the course of my life. I need to know who that guy was, what he was like."

"Look, unless you're in an anomaly when the timeline changes you don't know it happens. You just go on living like it was always like that. Understand?" Connor asked.

"Yeah."

"Good, what's worse is knowing how it's supposed to be. Being the only one that remembers" I said.

"It can drive you mad." He said.

Connor laughed. "Yeah, it can drive you mad. This is your life, how 'bout you focus on it. Cool?"

"Cool." He said.

"There is no going back." I said turning walking off with Connor following me.

We crouched down next to Becker as he started to wake up.

"You alright mate?" I asked.

"What do you think, I almost had my arm cut off." he said.

"You're alright then." Connor said,

Becker laughed a little.

"That's new, did the Albertosaurus knock some sense into you." I said to him grinning.

We heard the crunching of heels on the gravel behind us.

"Mr Temple," a woman said, "I'm Angelica Finch, director of operations here."

Connor and I both stood up.

"Pleasure to meet you," Connor said giving me the look which said he would deal with it.

"Actually, I think we've met before. Care to tell me what you were doing at Cross Photonics six months ago pretending to be an internet repair man?" she said to him.

I looked at him as if to say _that's where you went._

"Not really, no." he said.

"Ok then. I understand you're refusing transport home." She said.

I started speaking before Connor could.

"Colonel Hall wants to put us on a plane back home. That won't sort this mess out. The only way we can sort this out is if we go back through the anomaly, before one of us creates a time paradox thing."

"You obviously have experience with these things, valuable experience. We could use someone like you three." Angelica said.

"That's not a good idea." Connor said.

"But we could work together, control these anomalies." She said to us.

"Oh now that you put it like that, still not a good idea," I said.

"Why is a bad idea?"

"Cause the anomalies aren't meant to be controlled. You start messing with this stuff it gets very bad, very fast. Just let the anomalies be, and put everything back." I told her.

"Sounds familiar, that's what Evan says."

"He's a very smart man, got some advice from another smart man who again took advice from another smart man." Connor said.

"Look, what if I could use them? Change things for the better? Save a lot of heartbreak. Evan might not even know."

"You want to save Evans wife?" Connor said.

I could hear his voice breaking and his temper rising. I put my hand on his shoulder and he looked at me. I gave him a look to tell him to go back to Becker.

"Look, he has a wife back home, I have a girlfriend, and I know for sure that I want to see my girlfriend again, and that her wants to see his wife. So, if you start messing with events six years ago, none of the events that led to them getting married and me and my girlfriend meeting may not ever happen. Maybe you'll break a lot more than you can fix, just think about that. Trust me, if you do mess with those events this present for you might not exist." I told her.

She looked around for a few seconds before speaking.

"Get him up," she said, "I'll get you three back home."

"Thank you Miss Finch." I said.

We picked Becker up and got him to stand on his own. Connor supported him just in case Becker feinted. We followed Ange to the anomaly.

"Miss Finch, how can I help you?" a soldier asked.

"These gentlemen need priority access to the anomaly site."

"Yes Miss Finch."

"Hey," I said, "Your guys they took our guns. We'll need them back."

"I'm afraid that's not possible."

"What?" I said.

"You guys need to get back as soon as you can."

I pulled out my anomaly device and pointed it at the anomaly. The device immediately picked up a reading.

"There's three hours left until that anomaly closes." I said.

"How do you know that?" she asked.

"This takes readings and tells how long is left." I told her.

"Robert," Becker said, "It's my job to get you two home safe. We'll take care of the guns later."

"Becker, you need to get home and get medical attention properly. I can take care of myself, get back to the ARC and I'll follow you, just make sure Matt waits for me," I said walking off, "Oh, and tell Jess I owe her dinner." I shouted turning around and walking backwards.

I turned around and ran off out of the old mine and towards the camp. I saw the armoury truck and ran off towards it. I slowed down to a walk and climbed up the steps, opened the door and walked in. the inside of the truck was full of weapons on racks. On a bench at the front of the truck were the rifles and pistol. I walked forward grabbed the weapons and stuck the two pistols in my waistband and carried the rifle. As I climbed out of the truck two soldiers were walking towards me.

"Sir, we must ask you to put the weapons back in the truck." One of the soldiers said.

"Yeah that's not gonna work." I carried on walking.

As I walked past them they put their hands on my shoulder to stop me.

"Did I not make it clear sir? Put the weapons back in the truck. They are the property of Project Magnet."

"No, they're my property, the property of the Anomaly Research Centre and property of the British government." I said.

"Sir put them back or we will use force." The other soldier said.

I grabbed the arm of the soldier and flipped him over. The other soldier went to pull his weapon out but before he could I punched him in the face and he fell to the ground. The other one started to get up but I pulled the trigger for a Taser dart on the rifle and the dart hit the soldier square in the chest. His body went into spasms and he fell to the ground. Just as the soldier hit the ground Evan walked around the corner.

"Fair enough." He said.

"Evan I've got to go. I can't help out here any longer, not that I done much anyway." I told him.

"I know that, but I need to be able to contact you for help."

"You seem to be doing an alright job here. That's how we started out; we started at the home office and then got funding to move out of there and into the ARC."

"I know but I just need to be able to get in contact just in case something strange or bad happens."

"You're already at the top of the strange scale with anomalies Evan. But I guess you've got a business site? And I'm guessing your e-mail is on there. Once I get back to my time I'll e-mail you. But you've got to remember it will of happened for you over six months ago but it will only of happened a few hours ago for me." I told him.

"You're right, but also I want to know…" he was interrupted by the sound of the Albertosaurus waking up.

"Fuck, Evan I need to go, tell me when I get back." I ran off to the old mine building.

I ran down the ramp to the anomaly and the soldiers got out the way and I ran through. I came into the anomaly junction and looked around for the anomaly I had come through originally. I saw an anomaly with a knife stuck in the ground. As I walked over the anomaly started to flicker. I broke into a run and as I was close to the anomaly it started to fluctuate. I sprinted and just as it was about to close I jumped through the anomaly and landed on the hard tarmac of the London alley.

"Ouch." I said pushing myself off the ground.

"Finally, nice of you to join us, we missed you here." Matt said helping me up off the ground just as the anomaly closed.

"Is that Robert?" Jess screamed through the coms.

"Yes Jess it's me," I said, "Next time can you try talking a little quieter, please."

"Sorry Robert, it's just I was worried."

"Yeah well I'm back now. We'll talk when I get back to the ARC. I've got something I need to do when I get back."

"Ok, hurry up." Jess said.

"Got it, I'll get there as soon as I can." I said.

"Ok, see you later." She said.

I took my earpiece out.

"Right now that the anomaly had closed I guess we can wrap this up." Matt said.

"Yeah, you're right, just set up a perimeter just in case the anomaly opens again." I told him.

"I already have done that."

"Good man, one step ahead. Now how about we get back to the ARC and carry on with our party." I said walking off to the truck.

* * *

Right Chapter 7 is going to be short so anyone who has ever wanted to see any anomalies/creatures that have never been in Primeval leave me an idea in the reviews for the next chapter. Cheers people


	8. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

Matt and I walked into the central hub at the ARC. It was still early in the morning as I had gone through at about half past twelve in the morning.

"You do know with your little escapade we didn't go home like planned." Lester said sarcastically.

"Yeah well we all know how much you love your work Lester. Anyway it's still early, the pubs should still be open, how 'bout we go out and have a couple of drinks." I said.

"I'm game." Connor said.

"You're always game Connor, but aside from that I'm fine with that." Abby said holding Connors hand.

"My wife would kill me if I went out so that's a no can do from me." Lester said.

"Becker, what about you?" I asked jokingly.

"What do you think Robert, I've almost had my arm cut off, do you really think I'm gonna go out drinking."

"True that, Jess how 'bout you?"

"Yeah alright, I'll shut the ARC down then go with you." She said smiling at me.

"Matt, Emily, how about you?"

"I'm fine. I was going to get some sleep before tomorrow" Emily said.

"Same here, I've been working my arse off." Matt said.

"Ok, I've just got some things I need to do so you lot go ahead and go and I'll catch up." I said taking over the ADD.

"Right, we'll see you in a couple of minutes then." Connor said.

I waved my hand over my shoulder at them and started tapping at the keyboard on the ADD. I brought up the Cross Photonics website and looked for Evans e-mail address. On the main page was his e-mail address. I clicked on it and brought up an e-mail.

_Evan,_

_It's Robert, you told me to get in contact with you at the anomaly site around six months ago, so if you need anything you're unofficially part of the ARC team here, unofficially under my control. So any questions e-mail me back and I'll help as much as I can. Also if you need me to fly out I can just give me notice and you arrange the flight. I'll clear all this and get us linked and all under one central control._

I finished typing and pressed send. Tapping on the keyboard I shut all the external functions down initiated the shutters to close and linked my phone to the ADD in case an anomaly opened. I got up and ran off after them all.

* * *

if anyone has any requests for a creature or time period/ world (real or fictional) post them in reviews


	9. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

I woke up and looked at my phone. The time was half past twelve in the afternoon. I had gotten home at about five o'clock in the morning so had slept all morning. I had five missed calls from each member of the team except Emily, who still hadn't learnt how to use a phone. I checked through them and they were all at the same time, also as well as the missed calls they had each sent me a text. I read through them and they all said the same thing.

I climbed out of bed, got a shower and fresh clothes. I picked up my car keys. After the New Dawn incident four months ago I had left my truck at the ARC and bought a car which a lot easier to get around in. I revved the engine and sped off towards the ARC.

As I walked into the Central hub even Lester was standing around the ADD. They looked over as the pneumatic hiss of the doors closed behind me. I walked over to the ADD and Lester gave me a disapproving look.

"Why did you each call me and text me?" I asked knowing the answer.

"We received an e-mail from an Evan Cross this morning saying that there was an anomaly open in a Park in Vancouver." Lester said.

"I guess you want an explanation then."

"Yes that could make things clearer."

"Right, well that anomaly we went through this morning lead to an anomaly junction. I got thrown through by an angry Albertosaurus. I tried to find my way back but went through the wrong one and ended up at an old mine in Vancouver where an anomaly had opened earlier. I was arrested by some Canadian Air Force officers who took me and introduced me to Colonel Hall…"

"Just get to the point." Lester said.

"I thought you wanted the whole story?" I asked.

"Just carry on."

"Well basically six years ago, notice that key part, an anomaly opened in a warehouse that Evan went to look at for his business to use. He found the anomaly and his wife was killed by an Albertosaurus, that same one that we had today. The anomaly that was at the warehouse also lead to that anomaly junction. So when the Albertosaurus went through to Evans life an ARC employee went through and stopped Evan being killed but he was killed in the process." I gave everybody time to look around and to let them correct me.

"But everyone is here." Jess said.

"Well spotted, this member was from the future around this time. But before Mac could join the ARC Evan went to tell his family but then he found that Mac was still alive, so Evan hired Mac to work for him to stop him getting killed. Then Evan started to develop tech that does the same job as our ADD but nowhere near as the same capacity as ours. Also when Evan was saved one of hand held devices was damaged when Mac was killed so Evan took that to repair and use. So Evan started looking for anomalies and basically doing the same job as we did when we started. But only one problem with them was while we only had Helen to try and stop us they had a whole government project trying to do the same job as they were. So that project finally got wind of the anomalies and started trying to harness them for energy like Philip was. But while they were doing that they were taking creatures from their times and cutting them up." Abby looked disgusted. "And then before I came back here Evan asked if we could help them with the anomalies so I told him I'd get in contact with him and clear it so that they could be a Canadian branch of the ARC." I told Lester.

"Right seems a good enough reason, but why is six years ago important?" Lester said.

"Connor explain." I said.

"Right, six years ago was when the first anomaly opened in the Forest of Dean which lead to all of this." He said pointing to the ARC. "Six years ago an event cause a team to be formed in Canada which is the same time as us, what if that means that an anomaly opened up in countries around the world and some people found out about and formed their own teams. Also Evan is one of the smartest people that I've met. Coming close to Cutter smart." He enforced that point. "He's developed a company around the anomalies. All the equipment at his factory has something that can work with anomalies as far as I know."

"Right, so what you're saying is that six years ago anomalies opened over the world and each country has an anomaly team?"

"Yeah, for as far we can know," Connor said.

Before Lester started talking the ADD got an e-mail through from Evan.

_Robert_

_We captured a creature from the anomaly but it's not in any prehistoric creature files. It walks on four legs but is more like a mammal than anything else except it has no eyes or anything, and somehow it could sense when we were aiming our rifles at it, it's super quick and it took someone being behind it to finally take it down. We took blood and ran tests and it's come back as more bat DNA than anything else. You got any advice?_

I read the e-mail again and took everything in.

"Crap!" I shouted.

"What's wrong?" Becker asked as Lester walked back to his office.

"They've captured a Future Predator. Crap it seems like nothing we do can stop them from coming back; guess it must just be evolution." I said reaching for my black box.

"What does that mean?" Matt asked.

"It means they're in deep shit, come on, you're from the future, you should know this. So that means they need to kill that thing before it wakes up." I said getting my earpiece.

"What are you doing? You can't go help." Abby said.

"Even if you could, your black box wouldn't receive from Canada." Jess pointed out looking at as if to say that she didn't want me to go.

"Right, before Canada in between everything else I was working on I started to look at the anomalies, with some help from Connor. I isolated the two main parts of an anomaly, you have the time movement which takes you back or forward in time and then you have the movement part which changes your location. So after some long and sleepless nights and lots of them I managed to split the two key parts apart, now don't panic when I say this but I've actually found a way to control anomalies. Even Connor can't see a flaw in the equation." Everyone looked at Connor as he nodded. "I built a separate device to control them. With it you're able to set a location or time period or both. Just doing a location will just take you to that place present day, setting a time will just move you in time but you will stay in the same location, but a two in one is just a normal anomaly. So back to the point I can get to Canada using my anomalies, but the point about coms is still the issue. I'll just use my phone. Now does anyone want to come with me?" I asked.

Just then the alarm went off to signal an anomaly.

"Really, right now, so now it's just gonna have to be me go because you lot need to stay here, Connor you're in charge."

I ran off to my office to get the new device. I grabbed it off my desk and turned it on. It beeped as it started up. On the main screen there were three options each on the different anomaly. I pressed the location option and there was a dial in the centre screen with all the main countries on. I circled round to Canada and selected it. Outside that circle another circle popped up with cities on. I circled left to Vancouver and selected it. An anomaly opened up in my office and I stepped through it.

On the other side of the anomaly I stepped into the morning sun light of Vancouver. It was a breezy day and the trees were blowing in the light wind. I pulled out my pistol from my jacket which I had also grabbed when I was in my office. I looked around to try and find out where I was. I pulled out my phone and opened the GPS and put in the Cross Photonics building. My location popped up on the screen and so did the Cross Photonics building.

I walked out of the small park and came out onto a street with businesses on it. I looked around to check my bearings. About five hundred metres down the road was a car hire. I walked down the street and looked past the gate and could see it was closed. I climbed over the fence and jumped down into the car park. I pulled out my multi tool and opened my screwdriver. I pushed it into the gate lock and started twisting it around, the lock clicked and the padlock fell to the ground. I pushed the gate open and walked over to the cars. I walked up to a Ford Focus. I aimed the pistol at the lock of the door and pulled the Taser trigger. The dart pierced the lock and sent a shock through the car disabling the alarm and locks. I opened the door, climbed in and looked around the car for the keys. I checked the glove compartment but all that was in there was a booklet about the company. I pulled down the sun visor but no keys feel out. I checked the central compartment and if the keys weren't in there I was ready to hotwire the car. Luckily the keys were in there so I put them in the engine twisted the keys and started the engine. I put the car in gear and drove out checking the directions on my GPS.

I pulled up to the Cross Photonics factory and parked the car. I found a back door and broke it down. No alarms went off so I guessed they were still in the building. I walked around the corridors looking for somewhere that Evan would use for an anomaly research centre. I walked around a corner when I bumped into someone.

"How'd you get in here?" she asked.

"Back door was, well is now open. I'm looking for Evan Cross."

She looked at the pistol in my hand. "Why?"

"He needed my help with something, something about a bat." I said putting my pistol behind my back.

She turned around to see if there was anyone else in the same part of the corridor. "Are you from the ARC?"

"I can't answer that question." I said to her.

"Bit of a giveaway considering you're wearing an ARC jacket. I'll take you to Evan." She said walking past me.

I turned on my feel following her round the corner. She walked down a metal stair case into a lower part of the building. It was darker down here because there were metal towers of pipes and the stair case was backed against a concrete ledge. The only lighting was what got through from the upper area or small red lights. She walked to a door and put a password in on a keypad next to the door. The door hissed open and light flooded out. She stepped inside and so did I.

"Toby, you got those test results?" Evan shouted from an elevated platform.

"Yeah, I got the test results, I've also got company." Toby said.

Evan walked down the stairs and looked over to us.

"Robert," he said nodding.

"Evan, you wanted some help." I said.

"Yeah, but more to the point, how did you get here so quick?"

"Details aren't important, where's the creature and where's the anomaly?" I asked looking at him.

"You guys know each other?" Toby said waiting for an explanation.

"Yeah, not properly though, that incident at the mine when Mac told you about two people from the ARC Robert was one of them. Then before the Albertosaurus woke up I asked if he could help with the research here and he agreed."

"Fair enough, but where's the rest of the ARC team?" Toby asked.

"An anomaly opened before I left so they're dealing with that. This is a bigger priority though, where's the creature?" I asked.

"You sound like you know it." Evan said while Toby walked off to a computer.

"The ARC has had a couple of run-ins with it, it's a future predator, mutated bat, and as you can guess from the future."

"Sounds bad, exactly how bad?" Evan said.

"It sees in sound so it can see muscle movements and heart beats, that how it knew about you pulling the trigger, it's super quick that's why you can never see it longer than a couple of seconds, unless it's hunting you head on." I told him.

"How far from the future?"

"Clash with humanity, wipes humanity out." I told him.

"Ok so what we gonna do with it?" Evan asked.

"We've got to…" I was interrupted by a crashing sound coming from a side room.

There was a scuffing in the air vents above us. I raised my pistol to fire a Taser but Evan pushed my hands down. We heard an air vent open on the outside of the room and a thump on the floor.

"What did you do that for? I could of stopped it." I shouted.

"Unless you want to fry all the internal systems as well such as lights and locking mechanisms I suggest you don't do that." Toby said tapping at the keyboard.

"Toby, put the building into lock down, now." I told her.

"What's the point in that, we're just trapping that thing in here with us." Evan said.

"Right, I've seen the devastation those things can cause. Six years ago one killed a whole team of fully armed and fully trained soldiers in a matter of seconds. Then two years ago two of them managed to wipe out a Saber-Toothed Tiger, two Velociraptors, Silurian scorpions and Mere-creatures. And then they managed to wipe out the human race, so I know what I'm doing Evan. If that thing gets out into the city it will cause devastation and mass killings. Now, Toby, lock down the building." She looked at Evan as I said this, he nodded.

She tapped on the keyboard and the building started to go dark and doors locked.

"Right, so what do we do now?" Evan asked.

"We kill it. Evan you have to ability to open doors even in lockdown. So you and me hunt it down finish it off and get it back through the anomaly. Toby, you stay here and look on cameras for it, radio us if you find it." I said taking an earpiece off the desk.

"Got it," Toby said

"We'll want proper weapons though won't we?" Evan asked.

"Get a couple of rifles, I can turn up the voltage on my darts to be able to fry it but I'd rather know I have the capability to kill it straight away." I said looking at the gun cabinet.

Evan walked over to it, opened it up and pulled out two M4 rifles. He threw one to me with a couple of magazines. I loaded one mag and pulled the safety off.

"Ready?" I asked them as I walked to a door.

"All radio systems synced and ready." Toby said.

"Loaded and ready." Evan said coming over to the door and placing his hand over the door locker.

"Go." I said.

Evan put his hand on the scanner and the door opened. I spun through the door pulling the rifle into my shoulder. I checked all the places it could hide. I looked up to see if it was crawling across the ceiling. It wasn't anywhere to be seen.

"It's not here." I said to Evan as he came through.

"Toby, got anything on screen?" Evan asked.

"Not yet, I haven't seen anything." Her voice came through crackly with static.

I walked through the building with the red lights giving off little light but just enough to see where I was and anything thirty metres in front of me. There were so many places it could hide behind or on top of. I heard buzzing coming from the roof, I looked up just as something dashed across the ceiling.

"Guys, I just got something on screen." Toby said.

"I know, I just saw it, follow it Toby, where'd it go?" I asked.

"Red block, B section, Evan, Dylan just arrived and she's in that section!" Toby said with worry in her voice.

Evan ran off without saying anything. I sprinted off after him he took two steps at a time as he ran up a stair case. I caught up with him as he stopped at corner. On the corner of the wall was three claw marks.

"We're on the right track, that's how the predator checks corners." I told him looking around the corner.

"I don't care about how it does stuff, I just want to find it and kill it before anything happens." He ran off down the corridor.

"Evan, it's about to come across Dylan." Toby said.

We ran round a corner and saw the predator. I pulled up my rifle and let loose with rounds. The rounds flew towards the predator. It leapt out of the way when the first crack went off. It jumped up onto the roof yet again. I fired shots up at the roof but the predator kept moving out of the way. After a few seconds my first magazine was empty. After I started to reload the predator dashed off.

I looked around to see Evan run round the corner. I ran after him. As I came round the corner I saw him hugging someone.

"Evan, come on, we need to finish this." I said.

"You carry on, I'm getting Dylan back to the VARC." He said.

"VARC?" I asked.

"Vancouver Anomaly Research Centre, I needed a name for us." He said.

"Evan, there something you need to tell me?" Dylan said.

"We brought a creature back and it got loose. This is Robert; he's from the actual ARC in England. I needed some help and I knew he could help."

"Hey." I said.

"Hey, what time period are we talking about? Permian? Carboniferous? Silurian? Triassic to Cretaceous?" she asked.

"None of them," I said checking my mag, "We're talking future period, kind of in the name, Future Predator."

"So, anomalies also come from the future as well?" she asked.

"Yeah, but they're the worst ones." I said.

"Ok, I'll get a rifle and a Taser and join you." Dylan said.

"I'll take you back, can you handle it Robert?" he asked me.

"Yeah I'll be fine." I said running off.

I rolled behind a concrete platform when I head snuffling. I slowed my breathing down to slow my heart rate and closed my eyes to focus on lowering my heart beat. The snuffling stopped and I poked my head over and tried to spot anything. The light above me started creak. I looked up and saw it shaking as though something had just jumped off it. I spun around with the rifle in my shoulder looking down the sights. I walked forward to the staircase and climbed up it slowly expecting to see the predator at the top. There was nothing at the top except a security office with monitors in.

I opened the door and looked in. The office was empty except for the sound of the buzzing of the computers. I stepped inside and bent down to look at the security cameras. My eyes flicked between screens taking in every little detail of this floor. I saw the camera that over looked the security office. On the next screen across was a camera a few hundred metres down the corridor. I saw the predator jump past the camera and knew straight away that it would have seen my heart beat no matter how far away I was. I looked at the camera over the office and saw the predator on the light above the office. I crouched on the floor just as there was a thump on the roof. The door crashed open and the predator burst in. I looked straight at me and I raised my rifle. I pulled the trigger but the rifle jammed.

I started to walk backwards trying to unjam the rifle but the predator was coming towards me. The muscles in its back legs started to tense as it got ready to jump at me. It sprung up and forward lifting me off the ground throwing me through one of the windows. The glass smashed into tiny pieces as I hit it. I fell onto the floor with millions of tiny pieces of glass. As I hit the floor I lost all the air from my lungs and my rifle skidded across the floor, pieces of glass cut into my hands making me wince at the pain.

"Evan, a little help here." I said.

There was no reply.

"Evan, come in, I need help."

But again there was no answer. This was when I realised that my radio had fallen out of my ear and was now in between me and the predator. I pulled the pistol from my waist band thankful it hadn't gone off. I twisted the dial on the Taser cartridge and turned up the voltage. I waited for the predator to come closer so I could get a better aim. The predator stepped on the small ear piece and crushed it.

It was a couple of metres away when I pulled the trigger. The predator had no time to move out of the way before the dart hit the skull and 100,000 volts coursed through the its body and through its brain. The predator fell to the floor in a heap. I got up and heard footsteps running along the corridor behind me. I spun on my heel and saw Dylan and Evan running towards me. I picked up my rifle, unjammed it and aimed it with one hand at the head of the predator. I pulled the trigger and a shot fired into the skull of the predator blowing part of its skull off.

"You okay?" Evan asked.

"Yeah, we need to put it back through the anomaly." I said to him tearing my shirt and wrapping my hand in it.

"Ok, we'll get a van and get it back. You need to get home." Evan said.

"No, I'm going with you to the anomaly, I need to see the future again, see if it's changed from when I was last there." I told him.

"You've been to the future! What is it like?" Dylan asked.

"Two years ago it looked like a major earthquake had gone off and destroyed everything, and just under a year ago it looked like a massive nuke had gone off and changed it all to a wasteland. So either way is not too good, that's why I need to see it." I told her.

"Ok, we'll take you to the anomaly. Let's just get the building out of lockdown and get it out of here." Evan said walking off.

Dylan followed him and when they were out of earshot I put another shot in the predators head.

Ten minutes later we pulled into the park that I had opened the anomaly in earlier. We stopped in-between two trees with a clearing behind them. I climbed out the van and walked into the clearing. Right in the middle was the anomaly. I walked towards it feeling the magnetic force from it pulling at my belt and phone. Evan and Dylan followed me dragging the predators body behind them.

"What now?" Evan asked.

"I take it through dump it and get as many predators in one place as possible then blow 'em to pieces." I pulled out a hand grenade.

"Seems a good idea, but how do we shut it?"

"I've got that covered." I said patting my back pocket.

"Ok, just be careful, we need you back." Evan said handing me the body bag with the dead predator in.

I took it and dragged it. I went through the anomaly and saw not the future but the Permian. I looked around in the sweltering heat to try and find the other anomaly. I walked deeper in to the past and climbed a hill. As I got to the top I saw something I didn't expect to see. Down the other side of the hill was the exploration team from six years ago that had gone through the anomaly with Cutter. I could see them looking around with Captain Ryan, Cutter and Helen at the front and the rest of the team following them.

Just then in the corner of my eye I saw another predator run down the hill and take out one of the team members. I saw it go over to its young and take the top off the box. Captain Ryan ran over to try and stop the predator but after two shots the predator had turned around and dashed towards him. The predator jumped and smashed into Ryan, slashing at his chest causing blood to fly everywhere. Just then there was a large raw as a Gorgonopsid came from behind the hill I was on and ran through the camp. I couldn't take anymore knowing what had happened that day.

I turned around and left the body bag and ran back to the anomaly. I saw it about a hundred metres away. I sprinted towards it and when I was about ten metres away it started to fluctuate. I sprinted as hard as I could and jumped through the anomaly before it closed. I rolled onto the cold grass of the park back in Canada.

"You alright?" Evan asked.

"Yeah, as far as I know." I brushed myself off.

"What was the future like?" Dylan asked.

"I was mistaken, it wasn't the future, it was the Permian, but I recognized why it was that time." I said to her.

"Why was it the Permian if it's from the future?" Evan asked.

"Six years ago, Nick Cutter went on an exploration for a future anomaly in a past anomaly. His team went through and were all killed by a predator. Cutter was the only one to make it back as well as his wife. The future anomaly had let predators go into the past and come through an anomaly in the Permian. So that Predator must have come through that anomaly as well and into this time." I told them.

"Ok, so how do we shut it?" Dylan asked.

I turned to face the anomaly pulled out the anomaly device and started tapping on it. After a few seconds the anomaly closed.

"Pretty cool, I need one of them." Evan said.

"Make one yourself." I told him.

I looked at the screen locating the anomaly I had opened earlier. It was about two hundred metres east of my position.

"Right, I've got to go now so I'll see you soon. Oh and tell Toby she's doing a good job and I'll have a new system for her soon."

"Ok Robert, now get going." Evan said.

I ran off back towards my anomaly and saw it starting to fluctuate. I sprinted as best as I could and got to the anomaly and jumped though. I landed face down on the cold metal floor of my office back at the ARC. I got up and closed the anomaly.

Out in the main control room the rest of the team were back from their anomaly. I walked out of my office and into the control room.

"How'd it go?" Connor asked.

"Well, it was a future predator. But it had come through that anomaly from the Permian era from six years ago. So when I got it back I saw the team that went through, including Cutter." I said walking over to Jess.

"So, is it all cleared up?" Lester asked.

"Yeah, anomaly is shut; creature is dead, so yeah all cleared up."

"Good, that's what I like to hear. Now that's the day done so off you go, back to whatever you do in your spare time." He said walking off.


	10. Chapter 9, part 1

Chapter 9, part 1

I knocked on the door of Jess's flat and she answered it. She was wearing a sparkling red dress with black heels and there was a rose in her hair.

"You look amazing." I said to her.

"Not too bad yourself. You look better out of that black bullet proof vest and black uniform." She said holding my hand.

"Come on, we'll see the movie then get dinner." I said to her.

We walked down to my GT-R and I opened the door for her and she climbed in. I got in the driver side and turned the engine on. The engine roared into life with a large growl.

"How much did this cost you? I can barely afford a decent car with what the ARC pays me."

"Forty grand or there about, I still get stuff from the army cause I am still technically part of the military." I revved the engine and drove off.

We pulled up to a set of traffic lights and on either side of us pulled up a couple of pimped up cars. The driver rolled down the window of his car and I done the same.

"Nice ride, what you got in the back of that?" he asked.

"Twin turbo, super injector system, fuel air mixer to boost power, all together boost 550 BHP to about 620 BHP, as well as a specialised AMG engine. Able to smoke your Focus basically." I looked at his car taking in the spoiler on the back and the fact he had ruined his car.

Jess tapped my arm, "What are you doing?"

"Trust me Jess, this is what I do when I'm off." I told her.

"Okay, you so certain about that, half mile stretch, next two lights, my Focus, his Celica," he said pointing to his friend, "Against your GT-R."

"It's on, half mile drag." I said rolling the window up.

"What are you doing? This is going to go wrong." Jess said.

"Jess, do you trust me?"

"Well yeah, but this isn't how I expected to start our date." She said.

"Jess, its fine, they can't win. If you read my entire file you would know about my youth." I told her revving the engine in the back of my car

"You boosted cars before you got your licence, and then as soon as you got it you went into street racing for two years before you joined the military." She said.

"Exactly, the most that Fiesta can have is about 450 BHP with the right parts. Then that Celica can have about 300 BHP with the right parts. If I guess right, they'll both be fitted with nitrous oxide and that will boost their power by about 100 BHP. So even still they can't beat me."

"Fine, if you know what you're doing." She said sitting back.

They revved their engines to try and intimidate me. I put my foot down hard on the accelerator and revved all 620 BHP so it drowned out the other engines. The lights turned green and I put the car in gear and floored the accelerator. I shot off in front of the other two and shifted into second. The engine was revving so much I was worried I would blow the manifold. The other two cars used their nitrous and started to close the gap. We passed the first set of lights and I shifted into third. I was making more distance all the time. The second set of lights was approaching and I shifted up again into fourth. I sped past the second set of lights and put my foot on the brake slowing all the way down from 150 mph to 50 mph.

The other two pulled up beside me. I rolled down my window to talk to the driver of the Focus.

"How the hell did you do that?" he asked.

"A combination of experience and power." I told him driving off leaving a cloud of tire smoke behind me.

"You know that was against the law?" Jess said.

"Yeah, I do. It's what I do when I get a day off though, surprised they didn't know who I was. Every street racer in London knows who I am."

"Obviously not then." Jess said smiling a bit.

"Yeah, so you okay after that?" I said looking at her.

"Yeah, it was fun. Better than an anomaly." She looked at me smiling.

"We're almost there, film starts at ten so we've got a couple of hours to eat." I said slowing down.

"Okay, you know you really don't look like someone who understands anything about the anomalies."

"Yeah well, I may have been a bit the type of person who never listened at school but after I left the army I met Stephen and we became friends, that's why his death hit me and Cutter the hardest because we had known him for the longest. But then when Cutter hired Stephen the only way he was going to work for him was if I was allowed the work for Cutter as well. So Cutter let me help and Stephen was the one that had gotten me an amazing job. I started to learn stuff on the Job with Cutter and realised how much I missed out on at school. So Cutter managed to get me a spot at the University he was at and I stayed there on a palaeontologist course. I finished it within half a year and then went back to work with Cutter and Stephen. Then we found out about the anomalies and now I'm here." I told her not taking my eyes off the road.

"It makes sense then, why Becker put you forward for team leader. You were the closest to Cutter and knew how to work all of this." She said.

"Yeah, I guess." I breathed slowly.

"What's wrong?" she asked putting her hand on my arm.

"Nothing, it's fine." I pulled into the car park of the restaurant and parked the car.

I turned the engine off and climbed out of the car. I walked around and opened the door for Jess. She climbed out and held my hand.

"Listen, if anything is wrong you can tell me, I'm here for you alright." She said kissing me.

"Thanks Jess." I said hugging her.

We walked into the restaurant holding hands. We stood at a desk waiting for someone to notice us. A waiter noticed us standing and he ran over.

"What can I do for you sir?" he asked me.

"I have a reservation for eight o'clock." I said.

"Your name sir?"

"Jones, Robert Jones." I told him looking around.

"Ah yes, here you are sir, if you would like to follow me." He said turning around.

Jess and I followed the waiter to our table and he put the menus down on the table.

"I will be with you in ten minutes to take your order for you drinks." He said walking away.

I pulled a chair out for Jess to sit on. She sat down and I sat opposite her.

"You know, I think we might have finally caught a break from the anomalies." She said.

"I think you're right. I hate having to be constantly dealing with some sort of creature no matter where it's from." I looked at the menu.

"Being stuck at a computer does get a bit boring. At least you're out in the field." She said.

"Yeah, but then I've got to do all the reports for that days mission, I've got to keep everyone safe, even Becker. There is a lot of work with being out in the field as team leader. Cutter never had to do reports or anything like what I have to."

She laughed a little bit.

The waiter came back over to us.

"Are you ready to order?" he asked.

"Yes, I'll have a large glass of iced coke." I said

"I'll have the same as well with a slice of lemon." Jess said.

"Is that all?" the waiter asked writing it down.

"Yes for now." I said.

The waiter walked off again towards the kitchen.

Ten minutes later he came back with our drinks on a tray. He placed our drinks on the table taking his notepad out again.

"What would you like?" he asked.

"I'll have the steak and chips, medium rare steak please." I said.

"I'll have the spaghetti carbonara." Jess said.

About thirty minutes after the waiter had taken our order he came back with our meals on a tray. He placed our food on the table and walked off again.

Another forty minutes had passed until we finished eating. We got up and went to the counter and we got the bill. I handed over my credit card and they put it in the machine. I put my pin in and paid for the meal.

We left the restaurant and walked back out to my car. We got back in and started driving off to the cinema to catch the film.

"Are you sure you're alright?" Jess asked.

"You know how Stephen died right?" I said knowing she would.

"Yeah, he locked himself in the creature containment area at Leeks warehouse."

"Well, I blame myself for his death, I could have stopped it if I had just locked the door myself when I was in there."

"It's not your fault Robert. You couldn't have stopped it." She said putting her hand on my leg.

"The thing is I could of. Before we all ran out, we were in the containment area, I could of locked the door and shut the creatures in there." I said to her.

"Listen, what's done is done okay? You can't keep blaming yourself for it."

"Yeah okay." I said accelerating.

I looked around at the surroundings and put my foot on the brake and came to stop.

"What is it?" Jess asked.

"Guess we spoke to soon about getting a break from the anomalies." I pointed into a building site at the side of the road.

"Great, guess that means we miss the movie then." She said.

"Yeah, unfortunately." I said.

I turned the wheel and went down a side road that went into the site. I pulled the handbrake and slid into the dusty car park. The dust cleared and I could see the glowing light of the anomaly through the trees.

"You want me to alert the rest of the team?" Jess said.

"Yeah," I said tapping on the screen bringing up the synchronised ADD display and console on the centre screen in the car, "Send out the alert on there. If the ADD has been off the alarm won't have gone off. You stay here while I go check it."

I climbed out of the car and popped the front. I opened a chest and pulled out a new design of weapon. I took a power cell and slid it into the back of the pistol version turning the charge setting to medium. I walked over to the anomaly raising the weapon. I put my head through looking at the time period. There were a lot of trees and some rivers that were very large running through the landscape and in the distance there were mountains. I recognised the time period as the late cretaceous.

There was a roar of to the left and the ground started to shake. I turned my head and looked off and saw a juvenile Tyrannosaurus Rex running towards me being chased by a Nanotyrannus. The T-Rex ran over to the anomaly and I dived out of the way but not before I was kicked yet again by a dinosaur. I went flying through the air and landed on the ground. I carried on rolling until I smashed into a concrete block. My muscles relaxed as I started losing consciousness. My eyes shut and I fell unconscious.

I opened my eyes to see Jess, Connor, Abby, Becker, Matt and Emily standing over me. I sat up but as I did this I regretted it straight away as my head felt as if it had been ran over by a Land Rover. I put my hand on my head to cushion it.

"What happened?" Connor asked.

"A juvenile Tyrannosaur came through the anomaly being chased by a Nanotyrannus. The Rex kicked me and knocked me out." I said being able to stand up.

"Do we know where it went?" Matt asked.

"No, Robert got knocked out and then I lost sight of the creatures." Jess said.

"What time is it?" I asked.

"Half past ten." Abby said.

"I was out for that long."

"Yeah, it was a hard hit, you just went flying hit the ground and slammed your head into the block." Jess said.

"Right, well unless they went up the side road they're still on the building site," I said looking around, "Everybody split up. Becker, Connor and Abby, you go left. Matt, Emily and I will go right. Jess you stay here. Open the glove box of the car and you'll find a projector. Stick it to the dash board, turn it on and it will show the screens of the ADD, then there is also a keyboard in there, hook that up and you'll have a mobile ADD, look for the creatures and keep us up to date." I said to everybody.

"Got it." They all said in unison.

I walked back to the car and got out another one of my new weapons. It was a larger, longer and more powerful rifle version of the one I had in my hands.

"Becker, use this. It sends out an electrical charge that disrupts the muscle movements."

"It's a toy gun." Becker said.

"Becker, if you trusted me with the old guns when I first started using them. Trust me with these ones." I told him.

"Fine, but the minute someone gets hurt we shoot to kill." he took the rifle and loaded the power cell.

"Right, split up, keep in touch, anyone see the creatures shoot, no hesitation. We can't afford them to get into general population, not after the fully grown T-Rex in the city centre." I walked off to the right from the car.

Matt and Emily caught up with me and walked behind me holding the older pistols. We walked through the construction site looking for any sign of the creatures. There were a lot of open spaces which if the Nanotyrannus had caught the juvenile Tyrannosaur it would have been in one of those. I turned my head to the right and saw the T-Rex run behind a half built house. I sprinted off without Matt and Emily realising.

I ran into the clearing and turned around as I felt the ground shaking and saw the Nanotyrannus coming towards me. It stopped a few metres in front of me and looked at me. It opened its jaws and I could see the large serrated teeth that I knew could bite through me with one snap. I raised the rifle and aimed at its open mouth. I squeezed the trigger and fired off a shot of concentrated electrical power into its mouth. It jaws shut straight away and I carried on firing down the body until it collapsed in a heap on the dusty concrete floor.

"Jess, where did the Rex go?" I said into my radio.

"It's heading in the direction it came from." She said.

"Jess, get of the car, now!" I shouted.

"Why? Nothing else has come through."

"Jess, don't argue with him," Matt said, "Get out of the car."

"But, what about the rest of the gear?" she asked.

"Leave it, just get out now!" I ran back to the car.

"Robert, the Rex just ran past us and we're on our way back to the anomaly." Abby said.

"I know, I'm on my way back. It's heading straight for the anomaly and the car is right in front of it." I said breathing heavily.

I ran into the clearing with the car. I sprinted over to it just as the Rex came out from between the steel girders. I ran round to one side and opened the door reaching for Jess to grab my hand. She was trying to stuff the projector into her handbag. The Rex was a few metres away. It may have only been a juvenile but it was still a few tonnes which would be perfect to flip the car.

"Jess, leave it. Just grab my hand." I said looking at the Rex.

"I can't not with how much this can help us." She said.

The Rex was one step away from flipping the car.

"Jess, come on, leave it all. I can make more." I told her.

"No, we have this we might as well keep it."

The Rex lifted its foot catching the car and flipping it through the anomaly.

"Jess!" I shouted running towards the anomaly.


	11. Chapter 9, part 2

Chapter 9, part 2

Before I could go through Becker tackled me to the ground.

"You can't go after her, it's too risky." He said pinning me down.

"I can't leave her in there. She's worth too much to me." I said fighting Becker.

"Robert, you can't…" Before Becker could finish his sentence I punched him in the neck.

I pushed him off me and got up grabbing my weapon. I ran through before anyone could stop me. I stood in a clearing in the cretaceous era. I looked around taking in the landscape full of trees and mountains. I walked on slowly looking for the car.

I heard a roar come from the left which sounded like a junior Tyrannosaur. I ran as hard as I could in the direction of the roar. Between two trees was my car lying on its side with the Rex trying to get in. I saw the Rex kicking it to try and get easier access. The car was staring to bend at the ends which meant it would break and go through the trees.

"Hey ugly!" I shouted at the Rex.

It looked at me and I turned the power on the rifle all the way to full charge and fired off a shot. It hit the Rex in the side of the face causing its head to whip backwards. It stumbled backwards and kicked the back of the car severing the fuel injection cable. Petrol started to drip from the fuel tank and because the engine was still on the sparkplugs were still working so if one little drop of fuel landed in the engine it would blow the car up.

The Tyrannosaur ran off as I hit it with another shot. I ran over and tried to push the car back on to its wheels. I put all my body weight behind it and it started to tip. As it started to tip Jess started to stir.

"What's happening?" she asked.

"The car flipped and now has a chance of blowing up." I said to her pushing again.

"Leave me then, save yourself and get back to the ARC." She said.

"Fuck no Jess, I am not leaving you." I pushed all the way on the car tipping it back over.

I grabbed the door handle and tried to open the door. It didn't move even a little bit. I put my hand through the window to try and open it from the inside but it still didn't work. I vaulted over the front to try and open the other side. I grabbed the handle and pulled backwards with all my force. The door opened a little bit but not totally.

"Robert, leave me." She said.

I didn't answer her back. I got my hands around the edge of the door and pulled hard. It moved only a little bit again but there was now enough room for me to stick the stock of my rifle in and use it as a lever. I pushed on the weapon and pushed the door open.

"Jess, grab my hand, grab it." I said holding my hand out to her.

She reached her hand out to try and reach. She was still too far away for me to reach. I got onto the chair inside and took her hand. I pulled her out of the car just as petrol landed on the engine causing a fire to lick around the car. I got Jess into my arms and carried her away. I looked back and saw the car engulfed by flames. I dropped to the floor protecting Jess by covering her with my body.

The car exploded in a loud explosion. The heat of the fire reached the back of my neck causing me to sweat a little. I looked around at the car to see if it had finished burning. I saw some green flames to start licking around the rear end. I remembered the nitrous oxide canister in the back which I hadn't hooked up yet. The green flames licked around the whole car and I turned away as the canister exploded and forced the car into the air a little bit. I watched the car fly backwards and disappear over the edge of a cliff.

"You alright?" I asked Jess pulling her up with me.

"Yeah, I'm alright, thanks for saving me."

"No way am I going to leave you." I told her.

"Thank you." She said kissing me.

I pulled away.

"You're bleeding Jess." I said putting my hand against a wound on her head.

"Oh, am I." she said falling backwards.

I caught her as she feinted.

"Come on Jess, let's get you home." I said picking her up and walking back to the anomaly.

I stepped through back into the present. Standing around the anomaly was the team and a very annoyed Becker massaging his neck. Abby and Emily ran over to us and took Jess for me.

"She needs to get back to the ARC and get medical attention." I told Emily and Abby.

They nodded as they took Jess from me and took her to the cars. Becker walked over to me looking like he was going to kill me.

"You have some nerve to do that!" Becker shouted at me.

"If you had let me go through I wouldn't have punched you! But no, you had to stop me from going through!" I shouted back.

"You never think of the risks do you? You always go head first all guns blazing! You never think of the consequences!"

"Do you want a repeat of what happened three years ago? Where someone goes through, and there's a way of them coming back you never leave them there! I am not letting a repeat of Cutter happen!"

"For christ sake Robert, do you know how risky it is to do that?" Becker said calming down.

"Yeah I do, but I am never letting someone get stuck on the other side of an anomaly. Especially when that person means as much to me as Jess means to me. Just face it Becker, I'm always going to break the rules no matter what." I walked over to the cars and got in one and drove off.

I walked into the medical room in the ARC and saw Jess sitting on a bed with Abby and Emily sitting in front of her. I walked over and sat on the bed beside her. She leaned into me and I put my arm around her holding her closer to me.

"You alright now?" I asked her.

"Dizzy, but the doc says I'll be fine in a few days. I just can't work that's all. But I'll be fine." She cuddled closer to me.

"She's a little concussed as well. She must have hit her head hard when the car was flipped." Abby said.

"It's a big wound, not deep but quite long. I cleaned it out on the way here and the doctor put some Steris strips on it to close it over." Emily told me.

"Thanks guys," I turned to Jess, "Can you stay at mine now until you're able to work again? I just want to be able to keep an eye on you in case anything happens."

"Yeah sure I can if it makes you happy." She said kissing my cheek.

"Thanks Jess. Becker isn't very happy with me. So if he seems a bit annoyed you might not want to mention me." I told them.

"What have you done now?" Abby asked.

"Well, when I went through to get Jess, he stopped me before I could go through. So I punched him in the neck so I could get through." I said.

"Ah, okay then." She said.

"Yeah, right I'm gonna go check if the anomaly has closed now." I got off the bed and walked out of the medical room.

I jumped down the steps into the central hub and went over to the ADD and tapped on the keyboard. I brought up security cameras on the site and saw the anomaly closed. I pulled up readings and it said it had been closed for around half an hour and had only been open for around three hours. It was still a short time for an anomaly to be open I thought to myself. I saw something in the corner of my eye on another screen but as I looked it had gone. I brought up security cameras and flicked my eyes over all the cameras looking for anything but I couldn't see anything.

Just at that moment in time the anomaly alarm went off and I tapped at the keyboard. I pulled up the location and it was at an airport about twenty miles south east of the last anomaly.

"Guys, new anomaly alert. I'm sending you the co-ordinates now." I said through the radio tapping at the keyboard sending to co-ordinates.

"Got it," Connor said, "Turning around now and heading to it. We'll meet you there."

I got up and ran off. I poked my head in the medical room and looked at Abby and Emily.

"Guys, new anomaly alert. You can stay here if you want to but I'm going." I said to them.

"I'll come." Emily said.

"I'm going to stay here and keep an eye on Jess." Abby said but I didn't believe her totally.

"Okay, come on Emily. I'll give you a lift." I said walking off to the car park.

I unlocked the truck and opened the driver door. Emily climbed in the other side and clipped the belt it. I shut the door as I got in and clipped myself in. I turned the key in the ignition. The engine revved and I slid the gear stick into place and drove off out of the car park.

Twenty minutes later we pulled into the airport. I looked around and saw Becker, Connor and Matt in a hanger. I pulled the handbrake and slid the backend of the truck out as I came into a hanger. Me and Emily climbed out and I pulled my rifle out and turned the charge on and Emily slid a magazine into her pistol.

"Do we know where it is?" I asked.

"Look up." Matt said.

I tipped my head back and saw just below the roof of the hanger was the anomaly. The shimmering light reflected off the metal of the hanger sending a light around the hanger brightening in up a little bit more than the lights were.

"How we gonna deal with this then?" Becker asked.

"Deal with it exactly like we dealt with the one six years ago." I said to Connor.

"What happened six years ago?" Matt said.

"An anomaly opened at a golf course and a couple of species or Pterosaur came through. One was a flock of Anurognathus and the other was a Pteranodon. The Anurognathus killed one golfer and the Pteranodon got into the city but we got it back and it flew back through and the Anurognathus were all killed by Helen Cutter." I told Matt.

"That still doesn't help with how we'll deal with it." Becker said.

"Solves the creature problem at any rate. The locking device can be tilted up to reach the anomaly, its fine. We just have to make sure…" I was cut short as something huge flew through the anomaly.

It dipped down and went straight out the hanger.

"What the hell was that?" Becker asked.

"Some sort of Pterosaur, maybe Ornithocheirus." Matt said.

"No way, way too small to be one of them," Connor said, "But I still don't have a clue what it is." He looked at me.

"Quetzalcoatlus," I said, "Largest cretaceous Pterosaur to live, ten metre wingspan, eleven metres long, size of a small plane. If that thing gets in the air it's gonna cause havoc. We need to get it back through and shut the anomaly." I told them.

"What's the plan then?" Matt asked.

"Haven't really prepared a plan for a case where a flying reptile the size of a plane gets loose, guess we need to find a way to lure it back here." I said.

"Matt, Emily and Becker stay here, if anything else comes through shoot it." I told Becker.

"Got it." He loaded his rifle.

"Connor, you're with me." I said walking over to a helicopter outside.

"You're not serious are you?" he said.

"You know I am, it's the only way to get it back, and if we can't get it back, then we need to make the menagerie bigger." I said.

I opened the door of the helicopter and climbed into the pilot seat as Connor climbed into the co-pilot spot. I pulled the headset over my head and tuned it to the ARC frequency, Connor done the same. I flicked the switches and the rotors started spinning around getting faster and faster. The copter started to lift off the ground and I increased altitude.

"You know what you're doing?" Connor asked.

"Course I do. Part of my basic military training was to learn to fly a helicopter." I pushed forward on the joystick.

The chopper moved forwards and we looked around searching for the Pterosaur. Luckily because it was so large we could see it flying off into the distance. I increased the speed and flew after it. We could see it growing larger and it starting to turn. We carried on flying until we could see the full size of it again. It was still turning around until it was flying back towards us.

"Oh no." Connor said.

"Thank you for saying what I was going to say." I said.

"We going to move out the way?" he asked.

"Good idea." I pushed my foot down on the left pedal turning the copter around.

I pushed forward again trying to outrun the Pterosaur as much as I could.

"It's catching us." Connor said starting to panic.

"Don't tell me that." I pushed the chopper harder.

"Well it's the truth."

"Screw it." I pulled up on the joystick tilting upwards.

I pushed the speed forwards climbing metre by metre.

"It's followed us!" Connor shouted.

"Shut up Con, I know it has. It thinks we're a threat so it's trying to chase us off. Now let me do this." I told him.

I carried on pushing the helicopter higher and higher until the engines started to splutter. I flicked all the switches off and the copter slowed down until it fell backwards and started to fall nose down towards the ground. We passed the huge Pterosaur and as we did we saw it tuck its wings in and dive after us.

"What the hell are you doing?" Connor shouted at me.

"Only way to get it back without it catching us!" I shouted back.

The dials on the dash were spinning out of control. I flicked the switches back on and the rotors started spinning trying to bring the chopper back under control. The rotors finally spun fast enough to bring the copter back into flight. We started to fly back towards the hanger with the Quetzalcoatlus following us. The hanger came into sight and I pushed the helicopter even faster to get away from the angry Pterosaur. It was far enough behind for me to land the helicopter outside the hanger. Me and Connor climbed out and ran to the hanger keeping the Pterosaurs attention. We ran into the hanger with the Quetzalcoatlus following us. It flew up and straight back through the anomaly.

"Lock it!" Connor shouted at Matt.

Matt pressed the button on the anomaly and the locking beam shot towards the anomaly locking it and sealing the creatures on the other side. As soon as it was locked it started to fluctuate and it closed for good.

"That was close." Emily said.

"Yeah it was. But luckily we got it in time." I said.

"Come on, let's go back. Maybe we can go home before the next alarm." Matt said putting his arm around Emily.

We all walked back to the cars and got in them. We drove back to the ARC thankful that we could get some time away from the anomalies.

_It may be my __life_, I thought to myself, _but sometimes it gets annoying as hell_.

* * *

Now if anybody has any new ideas for the next chapter/episode would love to hear them, done this one from an episode of flying monsters. so any ideas tell me please. R&R cheers


	12. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

My phone started beeping and I woke up. I grabbed it and looked at the screen; the anomaly alarm was going off. I jumped off the couch and ran through to the bed room that Jess was sleeping in. I opened the door and knocked on the door frame.

"Jess, time to get up, we've got an anomaly." I said loud enough to wake her up.

She jumped up out of bed and ran into the shower. I heard the water turn on as I got some fresh clothes out of my draws and started to get changed. I pulled some clothes out for Jess and put them on the bed. She walked out of the shower wrapped in a towel just as I was putting my shirt on. Jess walked over to my and stopped me putting my shirt on as she looked at my back. She ran a hand over the scars on my back. I winced a little at the memory of how I had gotten that scar. She then ran her hand over the scar on my arm of where three years ago Helen Cutter had shot me. Then her hand reached the scars on my stomach of where just over a year ago a raptor had pounced on me and started trying to tear my stomach open but Becker had shot it before it could kill me.

"Do they still hurt?" Jess asked as I took her hand.

"Sometimes, it's just really the memories that hurt."

"You never told me about the scar on your arm, what happened?" she asked resting her head on my shoulder.

"Helen Cutter, she shot me over three years ago," I told her pulling my shirt over my head, "Get dressed, I'll wait for you in the car." I kissed her and walked out of the apartment.

She climbed into the car ten minutes later and held my hand. I started the engine and drove off to the ARC.

We walked into the central hub and everyone was gathered around the ADD. Jess ran to the ADD and climbed into the chair and started tapping at the keyboard.

"Where is it Jess?" I asked.

"Centre of Hyde Park, everyone knows where that is. Get in contact as soon as you get there." She said as we took our black boxes.

We ran into the car park and got in the car. I started the engine and drove out with Becker in the other car behind me. Matt loaded the EMD he was holding, Emily done the same in the back of the car. I looked in the rear view mirror and saw Connor and Abby doing the same.

We turned into a road going towards Hyde Park. I pulled hard on the hand brake and skidded to a stop.

"What's wrong?" Connor asked through the radio.

"Creature incursion, we'll take it. You guys carry on to the anomaly and get it locked." I said driving off in the direction of the creature.

"Okay, bring it back though and get it back through the anomaly. Be quick, we don't want another T-Rex incident." Connor said.

I accelerated off down a side road to cut off the creature. I hit a curb and jumped the car a little bit. I turned sharply and headed up towards the creature. I rolled down the window and pulled out a small EMD and turned it to its lowest setting. I pointed it out the window at the creature and fired. The shot hit it and it turned around and ran off in the other direction.

"Another Spinosaurus? Are you kidding me?" Matt asked sharply.

"No, a lot smaller and a lot older." I told him driving after it.

"What is then?" Emily asked.

"Angaturama, early cretaceous, thirty feet long and two tonnes, lived in Brazil." I told him.

"And how big was Spinosaurus? Because I can't really see the difference between them."

"Fifty feet long, seven to nine tonnes, it was middle cretaceous and lived in Egypt."

"Matt said.

"Abby, we're bringing it your way, watch out." I said into the radio.

"Got it, we'll open the anomaly when you get here." She said.

We carried on chasing the Angaturama through the streets until we saw Hyde Park coming up.

"Becker open the anomaly." I told him.

"Alright, its open now get that thing back through here!" he shouted at me.

"Yep, we're following it. It seems to know where it's going. I'd get out the way unless you want to end up in the early cretaceous." I told him.

"Yep, we're out the way. Now get it back." He said.

We carried on chasing it until we saw the anomaly. The large Theropod ran through the open anomaly. I pulled the handbrake on the car and slid to a stop again. I jumped out of the car and raised my weapon as I looked at the anomaly.

"It's coming back through!" I shouted as it started to shimmer again.

I fired a couple of shots into the anomaly and a person fell out of the anomaly.

"Okay, my mistake, get it locked now!" I yelled.

Connor pressed the button on the locking device and the anomaly shut and locked. I ran over to the person who I had shot and rolled him onto his back as he started to get his bearings.

"Where am I?" he asked.

I recognised the Scottish accent.

"Back in your time." I told him

Everybody looked at me puzzled.

"Robert, is that you?" he asked.

"It is Nick, welcome back." I pulled him up onto his feet.

Abby, Connor and Becker all looked at Nick in surprise. Abby ran forwards and hugged Nick. Connor walked over and put his hand Cutters shoulder. Becker finally walked over and put his arms around all three of them.

"Nice of you to finally join us again." Abby said holding back tears.

"I never thought I would get back after I went after Helen. The only way I got into the cretaceous was because when I was looking for a way home from the time I was in I wandered through an anomaly into that time."

"I take it since we're not dead you stopped her from doing what she wanted to?" I asked.

"Well, I didn't stop her. A raptor did after it followed me through the anomaly. She killed one group but there was more than one group of early humans." He told us.

"Who ever thought a raptor could do us some good." Becker said.

"Hate to break this reunion up," Matt injected, "But we've closed the anomaly so we need to get back to the ARC."

"Good point. Come on Cutter. You need to see this." I told him supporting him as I took him to the trucks.

Half an hour later we walked into the ARC control room. Nick looked around amazed at the new look of ARC. We all walked towards the ADD. Lester walked out of his office as he saw us come back in. Jess looked over her shoulder and smiled as she saw me coming back. I smiled back at her and she turned back.

"Everything cleared up?" Lester asked.

"Yeah, the anomalies locked, and the creatures back through." I told him putting my black box back on charge.

"And who's your new friend?" Lester asked.

"Old friend you mean Lester." Cutter said to him turning around.

"Ah, Professor Cutter, welcome back." Lester said.

"Yeah, I know. It's good to be back."

"Nick, we need to run tests to make sure you're fit and healthy. Also that you haven't brought some weird disease back from the past." I told him.

"Okay, someone's going to have to show me where to go."

"Abby, Connor, you two take Nick to the med room and get him checked up." I told them.

"Alright." Abby said walking off with Connor and Nick.

"How did he come back?" Lester asked.

"Long story involving a couple of anomalies," I told him, "The main thing is though; we've got our professor back."

"What's so important about Professor Nick Cutter?" Matt asked.

I looked at him with the most doubtful look ever.

"Come on, you read the files of the original team. Professor Cutter was the founder of the Anomaly Research Team; he had spent years trying to research the anomalies after his wife disappeared through one in the Forest of Dean. So he founded the team with the help of the Government and we moved into the home office. Then three months before the final incident in the forest we moved into the original ARC. Then when Helen went back in time to wipe out the first humans Connor, Abby and Cutter went after her to stop her. Connor and Abby got stuck in the cretaceous while Nick went through to stop Helen. Then when he tried to get back the anomaly shut and he was stranded in the past until today." I explained to Matt who understood now, Becker who already knew it and Emily who looked confused.

"Fair enough then, she obviously failed." Matt said.

"Yeah, I'm gonna go check on Cutter. See if he's alright." I walked off towards the medical room.

The door opened and I walked in looking around thinking how many times I had visited this room. Most recently when I had been attacked and almost killed by a Terror Bird. I had ended up in critical condition for around two weeks. It had pinned me down and started tearing flesh from my back. I passed out after a few tears. Jess had been by my side that whole time in case something happened. Then before that when I had been pounced on by the Raptor. I was only in here for a couple of days that time but it had still been serious.

Cutter was sitting on a bed getting checked up after three years in the past.

"Everything alright?" Cutter asked.

"Yeah, everything's fine. You all clear to return to active duty?" I asked.

"He's fine," Abby said, "Everything came back okay, no injuries or anything. No diseases that came back with him. So yeah, he's fine to return to active duty."

"Good, Nick, you started this team, it's only right you take it back and be in charge of it." I said to him.

"No," he refused, "You've been in charge of this team for three years so it's only right you carry on being in charge. Just because I come back doesn't mean you give control of the team back to me. You carry on, according to these two you've done a good job." He looked at Connor and Abby who were smiling.

Just then my phone beeped as I got an e-mail through. I pulled it out of my pocket and opened my e-mails. The new e-mail was from Evan.

_Robert,_

_We need your help. Project Magnet is looking for us again. After the incident with the Albertosaurus we had to move all our equipment out of the Cross Photonics building and into a smaller building I own. We then moved it all back when it was safe to. But they got wind of more anomalies opening, more frequently. So they decided to look for us again. We've moved it all out again into Toby's apartment. If you can get here and help us set it all up again we could really do with it._

_Evan_

"Who was it?" Connor asked.

"Evan, Project Magnet are on their case again. They've moved out of the Cross Photonics Building into an apartment. I'm gonna go help them set it up. Half the team comes with me half the team stays here," I said, "Come on, we need to get to the control room." I walked back to the central hub.

"What's up?" Jess asked me as she looked over at me.

"I'm going to Canada. Half the team needs to come with me, the other half needs to stay here."

"Who's going where?" Becker asked.

"Jess, Connor and Abby are coming with me. You, Emily, Becker and Cutter stay here in case an anomaly opens here." I told them.

"Got it, we'll hold it down here." Matt said.

"Good, while I'm away you're in charge. Come on Jess, time to go." I told her as I walked off.

She followed me as I went to get Connor and Abby. I grabbed my anomaly device and carried on towards the med room. I grabbed my anomaly device and EMD from my office. I walked into the med room with Jess following me. Connor, Abby and Cutter looked at me as I came in loading my EMD.

"Connor, Abby, you're coming with me. We're taking a trip to Canada." I told them

"Okay, give us a second." Abby said.

I walked into a lab and started up the anomaly device. I selected Vancouver just as Connor and Abby walked into the lab. I stepped through the anomaly into the Vancouver sunrise. The anomaly had opened in the same park as the last time I came here. Abby, Connor and Jess followed me through. They all looked around taking it in. Connor knew what to expect as he had been here before, Abby looked around taking in the surprise. Jess walked over to me and held my hand while laying her head on my shoulder.

"Can't we stay here a few more days?" she asked.

I kissed her forehead, "No, we can't. I know it's amazing."

I pulled out my phone and dialled Evans mobile. I had gotten his number in one of the emails earlier. The phone rang a couple of times before he picked up.

"Evan Cross."

"Evan, it's Robert, we're here, and we just need the address for the apartment." I told him.

He told me the address and I said it over again in my head to remember it.

"Cheers Evan, slight problem though, how we gonna get there?"

"Do what you done last time, steal a car," he laughed a little bit, "see you in a bit Robert." he hung up.

I walked out of the park to the car hire. I opened the gate again with my multi-tool and walked inside looking for a car.

"What are we doing here?" Connor asked.

"We're at a car hire, early in the morning, we need a way to get to the apartment. Make the connections Connor." I saw a car and walked over to it.

"Oh, right." he said.

I shot the car with a small EMD shot and shorted the locks and alarm. I opened the door and climbed in. The other three followed my lead as I put the address in my GPS. When we were all in the car I started the engine and drove out of the car hire.

I pulled into the apartment block that Evan had given me the address for. I got out of the stolen car and walked to the doors. I pressed the buzzer for 10C and the door unlocked. We walked in, me, Abby and Connor hiding our EMDs in our jackets. We called the lift and the doors pinged open. We climbed inside and pressed the button for the tenth floor. We got out of the lift and walked along the corridor looking for apartment 10C. I saw it and knocked on the door. Dylan opened the door.

"Hey Robert, come in." she said standing aside.

"Cheers Dylan, I brought some friends." I stepped into the apartment followed by Jess, Connor and Abby.

"Alright Robert, Connor" Evan said as he looked up from a computer monitor, "who are your friends?"

"Evan Cross, this is Abby Temple and Jess Parker. Right what do you need my help with?" I asked making the introductions.

"Right, well before the incident at the mine Project Magnet raided Cross Photonics and took us prisoner. They were going to steal our anomaly system as well but Mac and Toby got out before they could take the equipment and they set it up in another one of my facilities. Then we moved it back to the Cross Photonics building and set it up back there. But now, Magnet is back on our case and we needed to move it out again." Evan told me.

"Got it, right I'll help Evan get the system back up and running. Connor, you make the changes to make sure it runs like the ADD does. Jess, help Toby restart it and run all the checks. Abby and Dylan make sure nothing opens here." I threw Abby my anomaly device and I chucked Connor the memory stick with the ADD system on it from my laptop.

Connor walked over and pulled out a small laptop from the computer towers and stuck my memory stick in. I walked over to Evan and started connecting wires to computer screens and smaller towers linking it all up. Jess sat down with Toby at the computer desk and tapped on the keyboard running system checks. Abby and Dylan went to the window with the anomaly device to get a better reading. Connor was working on the laptop as fast as he could to get the system working properly. Me and Evan finished connecting every wire there was just as Connor finished making the adjustments to the ADD system. He plugged the memory stick into the units and turned them on. Lights flashed over them as they started up. The computer screens switched from satellite view of Vancouver to a totally digital view with the anomaly search running straight away.

"Bullseye, Jess, make sure it's all running correctly." I told her.

"It's all running as it should Robert," she smiled at me, "You want me to run a check for any anomalies that could have opened before it was running?" she asked.

"Yeah, go ahead. The handheld one should have picked up any that opened, but just double check," I walked over to Connor, "Nice work mate." I patted him on the back.

"No problem, wasn't really hard to alter the system."

"Don't get too cocky Con." Abby said to him.

Just then the alarm went off for an anomaly alert. I ran to behind Jess and Evan ran over to Toby.

"Toby?" he asked.

"Transferring all the co-ordinates now, check your phone." She told Evan.

"Got them, come on Dylan." He checked his phone.

"You're not going alone, we're coming with you." I said to him

"You sure?"

"Jess, stay here with Toby, Connor and Abby, you're with us," I said to the team, "Jess take the anomaly device." I said throwing it to her.

"Got it." All three of them said.

"There's the answer," I told Evan, "Come on, we'll use your truck." I walked out of the apartment.

The other four followed me down to the car park. Evan unlocked his truck and he climbed in the driver seat. I climbed in the passenger side and Connor, Dylan and Abby climbed in the back. Evan drove off checking the co-ordinates of the anomaly.

"Why haven't you called Mac in?" I asked Evan.

There was a long pause, "Mac, isn't here anymore." Evan said.

"What do you mean? Did a creature get him?"

"Right, prepare for a long story. That time I investigated what is now Cross Photonics an anomaly had opened which was another reason I checked it out. That Albertosaurus from seven months ago had gone through the anomaly and was in the building. I didn't know about any creature until Brooke, my wife, shouted that there was something there. The Albertosaurus killed her and was going to kill me. Mac came through the anomaly and stopped the Albertosaur from killing me but at the price of dying himself."

"That's what Mac was talking about then." Connor said.

"Yeah, so when I went to tell his family that he was dead Mac was there. So I hired him to stop him dying, but with that I changed the timeline. So when it came to the Albertosaurus at the mine, me and Mac had to chase it back through the anomaly to keep the timeline the same. But because Mac didn't join the ARC he wasn't there to go through and save me. So our Mac went through to stop me dying, and that's the last time we saw him. We don't know what happened to him." Evan said watching the road.

"Jesus Evan, do you know what could have happened?" I said to him.

"No, I don't. I didn't even know at the time."

"If you had died, you would have disappeared just like that, no one except Dylan would know you existed. To everyone back at the mine you would never have existed. Dylan would only know because she was in the anomaly and she saw it change." Connor said.

"Yeah, well I didn't die. So let's focus on this now." He said driving.

We pulled up to a shopping centre ten minutes later. Evan parked the truck, climbed out and went round to the back of the car. He opened the back door and pulled his weapons out. Dylan took one of the rifles and so did Evan. Connor and Abby charged their EMDs and so did I.

"You ever had an anomaly open in a shopping centre?" Evan asked.

"Once, two security guards died because a family of Raptors got through. It wasn't during major time though; it was late at night when the shopping centre had closed. So hopefully if this has opened behind a bowling alley we should avoid panic. If it's not, we need to get the shopping centre evacuated as soon as we get in there." I said.

Everybody nodded and we walked into the centre, hiding our weapons. As we got to the doors we heard screaming and people running for the doors.

"Great, guess something's come through." Connor said.

"Thank you for pointing out the obvious. We now need everyone out." Evan said.

"Abby, can you handle it?" I asked.

"Yeah, just get it all secure before anything happens." She said to us.

"We will, get it all secure before a creature kills someone." I told her opening the doors going in.

We pushed through the crowd running to the door looking over their heads to try and see the anomaly. There were at least five floors in the shopping centre. If it had opened on any of the top floors it would take a few minutes to find it. I looked over the crowd and saw a flickering light bouncing off a metal shutter. I pushed through the crowd, avoiding being crushed, towards the light. The crowd had finally gotten out and I could move freely. I looked around and saw the anomaly flickering inside a small storage room.

"Guys, over here, I've found it." I shouted over to the rest of the team.

They walked over as I started looking at the anomaly to see if anything had come through. There were a set of damp footprints that looked like they had come from a medium sized Theropod and then a set of prints from combat boots. There was then a loud roar that shook through the entire mall, then a few gunshots.

"Any of your team get here before us?" Abby asked.

"No, all of my team were in the apartment. So that means that Project Magnet found out about the anomaly and scrambled a team." Evan said.

"Alright then, we need to split up and find the creature and get it back through." I said.

"I'm going with Evan." Connor said.

Evan raised an eyebrow as Connor said this.

"I need to talk to him about the ADD." Connor said clearing it up.

"Alright, but I want Dylan with us as well." Evan said.

"Okay, Abby it looks like it's you and me." I looked at her.

"I'm gonna keep guard of the anomaly, make sure nothing else comes through." She said looking at Connor.

"Alright then, looks like I'm on my own then. Radio in if you find anything." I said walking off.

I walked off back the way we came pulling my EMD into my shoulder looking down the sight ready to fire if I saw anything hostile. I heard heavy footsteps coming from around the corner. I turned around the corner and saw the creature. It looked at me as though it was wondering how well it could eat me. I squeezed the trigger once and fired a shot at the Theropod. The electrical shot hit the creature and it turned around and ran off in the other direction. I sprinted after it trying to bring it down by firing from the hip. I heard a couple of gunshots and saw the Theropod stumble as its thigh was hit by the shots. I came around the bend and raised my EMD at the person who had shot it.

"Stop right there. Put the gun down and kick it away." I walked towards him keeping my rifle on him at all times.

He followed what I said.

"Now, get on your knees and your hands behind your back." He followed my orders again.

I walked over to him and pulled him up with one arm while keeping my rifle aimed at his back. As I pulled him up he grabbed my arm and flipped me over onto the floor. I rolled over pulling him over with me. He punched me in the face and my vision went bouncy and I tasted blood in my mouth. I wiped my hand across my mouth and felt my nose hurt as my hand brushed it. The punch had broken my nose. I punched him in the stomach once and then slung my rifle around a fired the lightest shot at him a couple of times. The shots hit him square in the chest and he flew backwards a few feet. I pulled him up and punched him in the face knocking him out. I slung him over my shoulder and walked back to the anomaly.

"Guys, I've got a Project Magnet member. Meet me back at the anomaly." I said into the radio.

"Alright, we're coming back." Evan said.

I walked over to the anomaly and Abby saw me. She ran over to me and helped take the unknown person. We dragged him over to the anomaly and dropped him on the floor. Everyone else ran over as they came into view. I leant against the wall getting my bearings back properly.

"What happened?" Dylan asked.

"I found the creature, it's a Theropod, and so if there is anyone still stuck in here we have to find them first before the creature does. It ran off when I shot it a couple of times but its injured cause this guy shot it in the leg. We got into a fight but I knocked him out." I told them.

"Robert, he's not Project Magnet, he's Mac!" Evan shouted at me.

"Hey, don't expect me to recognise somebody after they punch me in the face." I told him.

"But still, you should at least recognise him." Connor said.

"Alright, he'll be awake in a couple of minutes." I told them sliding down the wall.

Five minutes later Mac started to wake up. He lifted his head up putting his hand to his head. He took a few seconds to stand up and when he did he had to support himself on the wall. After a couple more minutes he was finally standing up straight and looking around at us.

"Who hit me?" he asked.

Everybody looked at me.

"Yeah, alright, look at me. I hit you Mac. I didn't recognise you and thought you were Project Magnet so I hit you." I told him.

"Fair enough then, you had to hit me that hard?"

"In my defence you did break my nose, and you were in a Project Magnet uniform."

"I thought you were Project Magnet as well, so I just took it as instinct to fight." He said.

"Alright, now that's all cleared up can we please get this creature and anomaly sorted?" Abby said.

"Yeah, split up again. Same teams but Mac you go with Robert." Evan said.

I nodded and so did Mac. We all split up and Abby stayed at the anomaly. I pulled my rifle into my shoulder and Mac raised his machine pistol.

"Jess, can you get into the camera system in the shopping centre?" I asked her.

"Who are you talking to Robert?" she said sarcastically.

"Stupid question, can you get in and look for the creature?"

"Already done." She said happily.

"Cheers Jess."

"That's one smart girl you got on the end of the radio." Mac said, not realising that my microphone would pick up his voice.

"Mac! Is that you?" Toby shouted.

"Yes Toby, it's me. Can you try talking a little more quietly?" he asked her.

"How did you get back?" she shouted again.

I pulled my earpiece out.

"I'll explain later. But for now just talk quietly." He enforced the point.

"Okay." She said as I put my earpiece back in.

"Right, Jess any sign of the creature?" I asked her.

"It's going up the stairs to the second floor. If you take the lift closest to you you'll get there before the creature can get up there." She said.

"Okay Jess, I'll see you when I get back." I ran for the lift.

I opened the lift door and Mac ran in after me. I pushed the button for the second floor and the lift doors closed and the lift started moving upwards. The doors pinged open and we ran out chasing after the creature. We saw it coming up the stairs and we raised our weapons.

"What is it?" Mac asked.

"I don't know, it's definitely late cretaceous period, Eastern North America, Theropod, too small to be a major carnivorous dinosaur. I'd say Dryptosaurus, only thing I can think of with that shape of head and small spine on the back."

"So, stay out the way of its jaws." Mac said.

"Yep, if we can, get it back to the anomaly. Come on, don't shoot it just scare it off. I'll shoot it with the lowest setting on my EMD." I moved up and squeezed the trigger once putting a shot in its thigh.

It fell backwards down the stairs and landed on the floor with a loud thump. It rolled over back onto its legs and stood back up. I put another shot into its neck turning it around to the anomaly. I kept shooting it to keep it going to the anomaly. Every shot kept making it trip as the electric shots sent its muscles into spasms. It picked up its pace as it ran to the anomaly. We turned the corner into the main part of the shopping centre.

"Abby get of the way!" I shouted at her.

She ran off about ten metres away from the anomaly as the Dryptosaurus ran through. I ran up and shut the door locking it.

"That's not going to hold it." Abby said.

"Yeah, I know. But considering Jess has the anomaly device and we didn't bring a locking device with us it's the only thing we can do." I told her.

"Nice work, you do know that door won't hold it right?" Dylan said.

"Yes I do know that…" I was interrupted by a smash on the metal door.

I turned the charge all the way up on my EMD and fired at the door without looking. The electrical shot hit the door and the charge went straight through the door and the crashing stopped and was accompanied by a loud crash in the small room.

"That's that sorted, it won't be getting up for maybe an hour. Now we get the anomaly locked before anything else can come through. So that means we need to go back and get the anomaly device and bring it here and lock it." I said.

"Alright," Evan said, "I'll go back and get the device, Dylan come with me, Connor as well."

"I'll come with you; I'm tired and need some rest." Abby said.

"Okay, come on, can you two keep the anomaly guarded?" Evan asked.

I turned the setting all the way up on my EMD, "Of course we can. Now hurry up so we can get it locked."

They ran off to the truck to go and get the anomaly device. I walked to the other side of the open space and slipped down the wall onto the floor stretching my legs out. Connor sat on the floor next to me watching the door and checking his phone. I pulled my phone out and checked if I had got any messages from anyone back at the ARC. There were no messages and no missed calls.

"How did you survive?" I asked.

"When I went through I didn't get injured like the first time. So I told Evan what he had to do with the anomalies and that he had to get me on his team. I went looking for anomalies and when one opened I would go through it. I went through so many anomalies I lost count. I saw so many different futures, so many different pasts. I just kept looking for an anomaly that lead back here and then I found this one." He told me checking the load in his magazine.

"You survived all of that with only an MP7, Jesus Christ Mac. You're lucky!" I told him.

"Yeah, I know."

I heard the sound of an engine in the car park and thought that Evan must have forgotten something. I heard the door open and looked around the corner to see who it was. I saw at least five Canadian soldiers run through the door carrying MP7s and tranquilizer guns. I pulled my head back and started walking away.

"Who is it?" Mac asked quietly.

"Project Magnet, we need to get out of here before they find the anomaly." I told him walking around to the stairs.

Mac got up and followed me. "So we're just going to let them get their hands on the creature and the anomaly?"

"No, we're the only ones that can get that anomaly locked. Because once Evan, Dylan, Connor and Abby get back Project Magnet are going to take them prisoner. So that means we have to get the locking device and shut it ourselves." I told him checking my EMD.

"What are we going to do about the creature though? If they get it they'll cut it up." Mac told me.

"I lied about it being out for around an hour, it should be waking up soon and since they don't know what it is they'll have the wrong type of tranquilizer."

"You don't know that. They could have been in the camera system and seen the creature." He suggested.

"No, not with Jess on a computer, she would have blocked any other system trying to hack into the cameras. Also she could have stopped them getting in as well. So I can guarantee they don't have the correct tranquilizer." I said.

I looked over the edge down to the ground floor and saw the soldiers moving towards the storage room. They set up a perimeter around the room and I recognised one of the soldiers. It was Colonel Hall.

"That son of a bitch survived." Mac said.

I signalled to him to shut up. Hall got a soldier to open the door of the cupboard and when they did they all jumped back as the head of the Dryptosaurus fell out of the room. The soldiers moved towards the creature just as it started to wake up. I rolled over in the small room and got up on its legs and snapped at one of the soldiers. The soldiers raised their weapons but the creature ran off before they could fire. I got up and ran in the opposite direction of the soldiers to find the creature. Mac caught up with me.

"Did you plan that?" he asked.

"No, it was a precaution. I thought Project Magnet would have picked up the anomaly readings and would be on their way so I just had to make sure if they did find it the creature would get out. So now we need to get Project Magnet out of here, and with one call I should be able to get them out, and then we get the creature back through the anomaly." I told him walking down another set of stairs following the sound of the creature.

I crouched down and carried on running after the Dryptosaurus. I could hear the sounds of the pounding feet running along ahead of me going deeper into the shopping centre. I heard a scream come from behind me where the anomaly was. I looked around and heard gunshots. Mac looked around as well and then looked back at me. We carried on running until we heard a car engine. We moved to a window and looked out and saw Evan pulling up.

"Here we go," I said, "Mac, can you take the creature by yourself?" I asked.

"Yeah, I doubt you'll be gone long enough for anything to happen." He told me running off.

I ran back to the anomaly and saw Evan, Connor and Dylan walk back through the door. There was a Project Magnet soldier lying on the floor with blood pouring from his chest. I looked around and saw a feathery tail flick around a corner. The medical crew of Project Magnet ran to the soldier on the floor. Evan and the other two walked around the corner just as I came around the other corner. Colonel Hall looked around at us.

"Colonel Hall, stand down." I said raising my rifle.

Connor, Evan and Dylan followed my lead and raised their weapons.

"You have no jurisdiction here civilian. I would advise you to stand down before I have my men shoot you here on the spot." He told me.

"Well you're wrong there Colonel. My team and I have more jurisdiction here than you do. So I advise you to stand down before I open an anomaly and let a T-Rex loose in the shopping mall." I told him.

He walked over to me pulling out his handgun. He looked at my jacket and saw the ARC logo on my sleeve. He pressed the barrel of the gun to my arm.

"Tell me who I call for references, and if your story checks out I stand down." He told me.

"Well you see Colonel, I can't do that because it's breaking the official secrets act, and because I'm from England that means treason. So either stand down now, or I'll force you to stand down." I told him pulling my arm away.

"How are you going to do that before I pull this trigger?" he said raising the pistol to my head.

I saw Evan and Dylan look worried but Connor just grinned at the Colonels mistake. I grabbed Colonel Halls arm, pushed it upwards away from my head as he pulled the trigger. I slammed my fist into his gut making him double over. I had his arm in my hand and I pulled the weapon from his hand forcefully. The weapon came out of his hand and I threw it in the air so it flipped and landed in my hand the right way round. I pulled the slide in the opposite direction and the weapon fell apart. I threw the main body of the gun into the anomaly. The Colonel got back up and slammed his arm into the back of my leg making me collapse. He took another soldiers weapon and loaded a fresh magazine. Before he could take the safety off I jumped back up. I rammed my elbow into the small of his back and then punched him between the shoulder blades. He collapsed to the floor dropping the weapon. I kicked it in Connors direction. I raised my rifle into my shoulder again pointing it at the Colonel.

"That's how, now tell your men to stand down." I told him.

"Stand down," he gave the order forcefully, "Now what else do you want?"

"To leave the anomaly to us and to get the hell out of here." I told him lowering my rifle.

He got up and walked away from me. His men lowered their weapons.

"If I walk away today the next anomaly will be mine. I promise you that, so watch your back." He told me.

"I won't but you watch yours. I've got all the training you have and more. I know how to handle these anomalies, and so does my team."

"When you say training what do you mean by that?" he asked me.

"Let's say the S.A.S covers all training and is very strict about who it promotes. In two years I moved from the lowest of the low up to a Captain. So you're going to want to watch your back colonel. Because I'm keeping an eye on any anomalies that open in Canada and my team have the entire jurisdiction on them. So back off Colonel, otherwise I end Project Magnet with one twist of time." I walked off.

I walked off to the corner that I saw the feathery tail whip around. There was small bloody bird like footprints on the floor leading down the corridor. I carried on walking down the corridor with my rifle raised and ready to fire. I heard footsteps running up behind me and Evan, Connor and Dylan caught up with me. I looked away and carried on walking down the corridor.

Connor put his hand on my shoulder. "What's up?"

"Nothing," I said, "Let's just get all of this sorted and done and then get back home." I said walking away from the three of them.

I turned around a corner into a stairwell and saw that the small footprints went down the stairs. I realised there were more than one set of prints. I looked down the railing of the stairs and saw the prints went all the way down the stairs into the car park.

"You guys go find Mac; he's taking care of the Dryptosaurus. He'll need your help. I'll take care of this." I jumped down the first set of stairs and carried on walking down the staircase following the footprints.

I reached the bottom of the stairs and was standing on the other side of a set of double doors. I pushed the handle down gently and eased the door open looking around the door into the car park. There was the sound of claws on concrete a little way down the car park. I opened the door quietly and crept out and looked down to where the sound was coming from. There was a small pack of raptors huddled around a body of someone they must have chased down and killed when they got into the car park. I fired a shot off at one of the raptors. The shot hit the small frame of the raptor and sent it flying across the car park. It smashed into a wall and something cracked, and it wasn't the concrete. The other raptors ran off all together and I finally saw the body. It was mangled to the point that only DNA would identify it. The left leg was torn off at just below the knee and was laying a few metres away. The chest was torn open and rib bones were sticking out at awkward angles and the face was torn to pieces.

I looked away and ran after the raptors. I ran up a small ramp and saw the other raptors running away about twenty metres in front of me. I raised my rifle again and fired. I fired as many shots as I would risk to try and take them out. A few shots found their targets and three more raptors fell to the concrete floor. The other three split up and ran off in opposite directions.

I ran after one of the raptors up another ramp and saw it jump onto a metal barrier. I fired at the barrier and the electrical charge coursed through the metal and went through the raptors body and it fell off the barrier and down another two levels and smashed into the bottom floor. I jumped onto a railing and jumped again pulling myself up on another barrier onto the next level. I saw the second raptor running towards me. It jumped at me and I turned my rifle in my hands and batted the raptor away with my stock. It flew through a window of small room. I turned around and saw the third raptor jump off a railing. I had no time to react and even though the raptor was small the force behind it was enough to know me over. It started biting at my chest trying to get through my bullet proof vest. I pulled a knife out of my boot and stabbed the raptor through the side of the body. I plunged the knife hilt deep into the raptor. I threw the limp, lifeless body of the raptor off of my chest. I got up and ran back to the stairs.

I ran up the stairs and came into the main part of the shopping centre and saw the Dryptosaurus running towards me. I rolled out of the way as it ran past me. I jumped up and joined Connor, Dylan, Evan and Mac in chasing it. We chased it back to the anomaly and it ran through the anomaly.

"Connor, the anomaly device!" I shouted at him.

He threw the anomaly device to me and I caught it in one hand. I tapped the screen of the device and the anomaly shut.

"Nice work, now come on. Let's get back and get home." I said walking out of the shopping centre.

The outside car park was clear of Project Magnet vehicles. I walked over to Evans truck as he unlocked it. I got in the driver's seat. Everybody else climbed in and I took the keys, turned the ignition on and drove off back towards Toby's apartment.

I pulled up and climbed out of the truck. I walked into the building and up to the room. I was ahead of everybody else as I knocked on the door. Jess opened the door and I stepped inside.

"Come on, it's time to leave." I told her.

"Okay, where're the others?"

"On their way." I said opening an anomaly for the ARC.

"Okay, Toby, can you tell them we've already gone." Jess told her.

"Okay Jess, thanks for getting everything working right." Toby said.

"No problem." Jess said as I stepped through the anomaly back home.

I closed the other anomaly I opened earlier and walked out of my office. The ARC was empty except for Lester in his office. I walked over to his office and knocked on his door. He signalled for me to come in. I opened the door and stepped inside.

"Where is everybody?" I asked just as Jess appeared in the office next to me.

"Out on an anomaly alert, it went off around half an hour after you left to go to Canada."

"You want me to go and meet up with them?" I asked.

"No, you've done some hard work today. Go home get some rest." He told me and I couldn't hear any sarcasm in his voice at all.

"Thanks Lester, nice suit by the way. Brings out the seriousness in your eyes." I legged it out of his office before he could change his mind and keep me at the ARC.

Jess caught up with me as I reached my car. I opened the driver's door but didn't get in. I signalled to Jess to come around and get in.

"You're letting me drive?" she asked.

I nodded. She climbed in and I got in the passenger side. I gave her the keys and she turned the engine on and drove off. She sped up as we drove back. I rested my head against the headrest and closed my eyes. The car sped along the road back towards my apartment and I heard the engine roaring behind me.

Jess started to slow down as she pulled into the driveway for my apartment. She turned the engine off and I climbed out of the car and walked into my apartment. Jess followed me through the door and closed it behind her. I walked through to the bathroom and turned the tap on for the sink. I filled my hands up with water and splashed my face. I rubbed the water into my face trying to wake myself up. My phone went off just as I turned the tap off. I dried my hands and took my phone out of my pocket. There was a new text from Matt. I heard the bedroom door shut as Jess went to bed. I walked into the living room opening the message.

I saw two words and threw my phone at the cupboard, the phone smashing through the glass on the cupboard door. I flipped the couch over and chucked the coffee table at the door. I punched the wall, my fist going straight through the plasterboard. I pulled my fist out of the cupboard and collapsed on the floor resting my head between my hands.

Jess walked out of the bedroom in her pyjamas. She walked over to me and crouched next to me. She put her arm around me and leant in close to me.

"What's wrong?" she asked me.

"It's Becker." I said with my voice cracking and my eyes filling with tears.

"What about him?"

"He's dead." I said breaking into tears.

One of my longest and best friends had suddenly been torn from my life. Killed doing a job that he could have backed out of at any time. He knew all the risks like everyone else, but somehow he was on the borderline of them when I ignored them. If anyone should have died today it should have been me, not Becker.

"What happened?" Jess said.

"The anomaly alert they were called to, the anomaly lead to the late cretaceous, a herd of Triceratops came through, followed by a junior T-Rex. They tried to get everything back through. They got the Triceratops through but the Rex was harder. Becker managed to chase it through but before it went through it bit Becker on the leg. His leg was mangled to hell and he was gonna lose it. But because a Rex has a toxic bite the stupid bacteria got in his blood stream, and with the fact he was losing so much blood his system just gave up and he died." I said trying to stop crying.

"Come on, he knew the risks Robert, and you know that. It could have happened to any one of us today, even Evan, Dylan and Mac. It's not your fault." She told me.

"That's the thing, it is my fault. If I had gone straight to the anomaly instead of coming back here I could have stopped it from biting him. It's my fault Becker died today Jess, and I can't…" I stopped mid-sentence as I had a thought.

I pulled out the anomaly device from my back pocket.

"I can change it," I said looking at the device, "I can go back and stop it, and no-one except me will know!" I exclaimed.

"Robert you can't do that, you could change the whole timeline by doing that!" she shouted me down.

"I know, but it's worth the risk isn't it?" I asked her.

"No, it's not. If you do that who knows what else you could change, just go to sleep." She said pulling me up.

"I would if the couch wasn't flipped over." I told her putting the anomaly device down.

"Come on." She said taking me down the corridor and into the bedroom.


End file.
